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Chapter Text

Most days, Ben does fairly well pretending that he’s just a normal guy – just another nameless face in a sea of Coruscant U students, pulling all-nighters at the library and becoming a regular at the on-campus café and going through the motions of college like everyone else.

And then there are days like today, when one moment he’s walking at graduation and accepting his degree and sitting through speeches like everyone else, and the next he’s on his mother’s jet heading back to the country he’ll someday rule.

Eight years later and somehow the thought is still just as preposterous as it was the first time his mother revealed the truth to him. By all accounts, he’s more than sufficiently prepared to finally settle into his role as king-in-training; armed with a master’s degree in political science and international relations, as well as years and years of his mother’s informal lessons on etiquette and diplomacy, Ben’s about as princely as they come – on the outside, at least.

On the inside he’s still that terrified sixteen-year-old loner, still desperately praying this is all some wild dream he’ll wake up from, still just a kid who only ever wanted his mother back and not the throne that came with her.

But that was never an option, and so here he is, his heart heavy as a stone as he takes in the verdant mountains and crystal lakes of Naboo.

Kaydel must’ve caught him peering out the window from where she sits across him, because she finally sets down her iPad for the first time since they boarded seven hours ago to give him a smile. “Only thirty minutes until we land, Your Highness.”

He’s lost count of the number of times he’s asked his mother’s personal assistant to just call him Ben, but the figure is high enough for him to have given up by now. “Thanks, Kaydel,” he replies, letting the use of his title go uncontested, and she acknowledges this with a nod before going back to whatever it is that keeps her occupied every single second of her workday.

It takes a village, his mother is fond of reminding him whenever he despairs at the seemingly impossible amount of work required of a monarch. Someday you’ll understand.

Ben wishes that day would never come, but he’ll prepare himself for it nonetheless if only to please his mother. Their relationship is still on the mend, still characterized by awkward pauses and shifting boundaries that speak to years and years of separation between mother and son, but he likes to think things are getting better between them.

Things are certainly getting better for his parents, the two of them sitting side by side further up the jet, his father bending down and leaning in close to listen to his mother’s hushed murmurs. Neither of them are big on physical displays of affection, both with each other and with him, but Ben thinks he catches glimpses of it sometimes, the love that kept them bound together all those years even when they were an ocean apart.

It’s in the way his mother coaxes more smiles out of his father than anyone ever could, in the way her tense shoulders and troubled eyes only ever give way to peace when she’s around him, in every word and smile and touch they share. This is the love that convinced a scoundrel to give up everything for a princess, that kept a queen sneaking away to her love even years after their worlds proved to be too different, that brings them back to each other again and again no matter what the world throws at them.

It hurts, seeing his parents like this now and finally understanding everything they were denied the night his mother sent them away for everyone’s safety. But now that the separatists are finally gone, now that Naboo is at peace again, now that the royal family is safe once more… maybe now they can finally get that second chance they’ve always hoped for.

And if it takes Ben moving to Naboo and finally assuming his responsibilities as prince to convince his father to come visit and spend more time together with his mother… well, that’s a sacrifice he’s willing to make.

He’s snapped out of that train of thought when Leia finally rises from her seat to come over and place a hand on his shoulder, squeezing in a maternal gesture he grew up craving and still can’t quite get enough of. “Welcome home, Ben,” she tells him with a soft smile as she nods at the window and the palace that’s quickly coming into view, and in her eyes he can see a love for her country that rivals even her love for her family, a love that made her sacrifice everything.

It’s difficult, trying to love Naboo when for so long he resented this country and its people for keeping his mother away from him. But this is Ben’s country now too – his country, his people, his home.

“It’s good to be back,” he says semi-honestly, bringing one hand up to rest over his mother’s. She’s so small, even with her standing next to where he’s seated. There’s no way of knowing when he outgrew his mother, when he finally grew too tall for her to enfold in her arms and protect from the world; all Ben knows is that one summer he was small enough for her to ruffle his hair and the next he wasn’t, and the realization had made the both of them choke up a little.

But that was more than ten years ago, and there’s no use dwelling on the past.

Ben forces himself to stay grounded in the present as they land, to focus only on what lies ahead as they disembark and step on Nabooian soil. Threepio, longtime head of the royal household, rushes over as soon as they get off the stairs, fussing over the queen as always while muttering about how he should’ve been allowed to come with. Leia placates him with the usual reminder that he’s much too important here at home, that the palace wouldn’t be able to function with him around, and just like that Threepio immediately perks up and turns to address Ben.

“Welcome back, Your Royal Highness!” he enthuses in his usual over-the-top manner, complete with a deep bow.

“Uh,” Ben runs a hand through his hair before he can remember not to, all part of his mother’s efforts to train him out of visible displays of nerves and discomfort. “Just Ben will do, Threepio,” he mumbles halfheartedly, knowing that it’s a futile attempt. If even Kaydel won’t budge on propriety, Threepio’s basically a lost cause.

In any case, his words are lost in the rapid-fire chatter between his mother, Kaydel, and Threepio, the three of them going over her agenda for the rest of the day and preparations for tonight’s welcome home ball that’s being thrown in a reluctant Ben’s honor.

His father comes up to him with a chuckle, clapping a hand on his shoulder as the two of them begin to trail after his mother and her quickly multiplying entourage, more and more staff seemingly appearing out of thin air to update the queen on a dozen different things. “Just go with it, kid,” Han tells him with a long-suffering sigh. “It’s been more than twenty years and he’s only gone from calling me Lord Solo to Lord Han. Just be glad he doesn’t insist on using your full list of titles.”

“Lord Han,” Ben echoes with a snort. “Does Chewie know how fancy you get among the hoity-toity set, Your Lordship?”

His father’s face twists into a grimace. “Wouldn’t freaking shut up about it as soon as they announced the title at the wedding. Only reason he stopped giving me shit about it was so that you wouldn’t get suspicious.”

They fall silent at the reminder of all the secrecy that had surrounded his childhood, and any improvement in Ben’s mood quickly dissipates. “I wish he could be here with us.”

It’s better, having his father around to keep him grounded while his mother and her team swirl around him like a hurricane, but having his uncle around would definitely add to the sense of normalcy he’s still desperately clinging on to.

“You and me both, kid,” Han shrugs. “But you know we can’t all three leave town and close up shop for the summer. Half of Chandrila’s roads would be packed with smoking cars in no time.”

He misses the shop too, with its grease-stained floors and crappy cars hanging by a thread and all the regular faces he’d grown up with. Usually he’d spend the first week of summer break back home helping his father and uncle before heading to Naboo, but nothing’s usual this year.

After all, this is the year he becomes king.

Here’s the thing about balls: if you’ve been to one, you’ve been to them all.

His classmates at Coruscant U would ask him about these events all the time, hoping and praying and angling for an invitation to one someday. Ben likes to think that not inviting them is an act of kindness, given how mind-numbingly boring these things really are.

He escorts his mother down the stairs as always, and smiles politely as they’re announced as always, and follows his mother’s speech with a brief one of his own about how happy he is to be back as always. At least this time he manages to get through all of it without stepping on Leia’s train or getting nervous mid-speech, so the evening is already off to a better start than literally every other ball he’s ever been to.

After the speeches comes the dancing, and while it’s customary for the queen to share the first dance with her son, his father quickly rescues him by cutting in within the first two minutes. With all eyes on their monarch and her star-crossed love, Ben is free to melt into the crowd for a brief respite before the usual suspects descend upon him.

It’s not like they’re all bad, the ladies he dances with at these things. There’s Jannah, practically his cousin by virtue of his parents’ close friendship with her father, who dances well enough for the both of them and only has eyes for women. Ladies Rose and Paige have also made it clear that they don’t plan on tossing their names into the hat for future queen, which makes their company infinitely more enjoyable. And Kaydel, despite being a stickler for propriety, makes for a good dance partner on the rare occasion that she isn’t by her fiancé’s side or putting out small fires behind the scenes.

No, Ben doesn’t mind dancing with these ladies at all. It’s a pity he can’t say the same for the others though, especially Lady Netal. She’s not after him for the crown – Ben knows for a fact that she has no interest in the responsibilities of the throne, not when she already enjoys the privileges of the aristocracy with none of the fuss. But she’s made it quite clear that she’s interested in… other parts of him, and Bazine Netal is a woman who knows what she wants and goes after it.

It’s an admirable trait in most people and most circumstances, but not in this particular scenario which finds her practically clinging to him in front of his mother’s entire court. A quick, panicked glance reveals no easy escape, unfortunately – Kaydel is dancing with Snap while Jannah is twirling a giggling Rose around the dancefloor, and Paige can’t cut in without risking Bazine’s wrath on account of her being his partner just one song ago. Ben takes a deep breath and resigns himself to his fate, dragging his eyes back to Bazine just in time to catch a glimpse of potential salvation.

A slender hand, well-manicured but free of the myriad jewels dripping off everyone else’s fingers and wrists, taps on Bazine’s shoulder, its occupant partially hidden by his dance partner. “Lady Netal, would you mind? I’ve simply been waiting ages to finally meet the prince.”

Her voice is unfamiliar but the accent is easily placed, one she shares in common with all the noble children who were sent away to elite boarding schools in England throughout their formative years. Another member of the aristocracy, then, but surely even stilted small talk with a stranger he has nothing in common with has to be better than this.

If Bazine decides to behave, that is. She turns to the newcomer with a scowl that instantly gives way to a look he’s not sure he’s ever seen on her face, one that almost hints at… fear? Whoever this mystery woman is, she sufficiently outranks the Netals for Bazine to immediately take her hands off Ben and step aside.

“Your Grace,” Bazine murmurs with a slight dip of her head, followed by a quick curtsy in his direction and a strained, “Enjoy the ball, Your Highness,” before she stomps off the dancefloor. Ben is too stunned by relief to track what happens in the next few moments, which find his mystery savior slipping into his arms and taking the lead.

And just like that, Ben finds himself dancing with the most beautiful woman in the room.

Chestnut waves brush her bare shoulders, a marked difference from the fancy updos or tumbling curls most of the women tend to prefer for these occasions. Her dress is simpler too, though no less elegant for its lack of an ostentatious train or blinding jewels, a perfect shade of forest green that draws attention to hazel eyes that remind him of golden sunlight filtering in through a canopy of greenery, jewel and earth tones coming together in an utterly entrancing way.

“Your Highness,” she finally addresses him with a smile, and– oh, freckles. He’s so weak for freckles, and her smile – it actually reaches her eyes, in a way that’s all too rare around these parts. “I don’t believe we’ve met before.”

That’s a shame, he instantly thinks to himself, followed by a prayer that he didn’t say so out loud.

Judging by the way she goes on, he hasn’t made a fool of himself just yet. “I would have waited for a proper introduction, but we tend to miss each other at these things, you and I,” she continues with a shrug of her shoulders, drawing his attention to bare skin that glows under the light of dozens of chandeliers. “I figured I’d finally take matters into my own hands tonight.”

Ben quickly snaps his eyes back up to her face before they can think to roam any further, and something about her earrings, delicately wrought starbursts contained within circles of dark rubies, jogs his memory. Your Grace, Bazine had called her, and while Naboo has its fair share of nobility there are few who command that title, especially this young.

He narrows it down just as she introduces herself.

“I’m Rey. Rey Palpatine.”

Palpatine, as in the granddaughter of Sheev Palpatine, Duke of Onoam, the greatest thorn in his mother’s side.

And oh, how her angelic smile curls into a smirk at the recognition in his eyes.

The song comes to an end before he can recover from this devastating blow, reeling from the whiplash of having a potential connection dangled in front of him only for it to be so abruptly yanked away.

“I look forward to our next encounter, Your Highness,” Rey Palpatine murmurs as she steps away from him, looking almost demure as she drops into a slight curtsy, and between one heartbeat and the next she’s melted into the crowd, leaving him stunned into silence and stillness.

This is what he gets for whining about every ball being boring and predictable.

His mother generously grants him a day’s reprieve from lessons after the ball, and Ben takes the opportunity to sleep in while he still can, before his mornings fill up with instructions on horse-riding and dignitary-hosting and ribbon-cutting and god knows what else.

By the time he stumbles downstairs, lunch has long been cleared away. The kitchen staff offer to make him something, but Ben finds that his appetite hasn’t quite returned since last night’s events left an unpleasant knot in his stomach. He puts together a quick peanut butter and jelly sandwich under the chef’s watchful (and slightly affronted) eye, and pockets an apple for good measure. With his father gone to town to catch up with Lando and his mother occupied with parliament for the next hour or so, it’s the perfect opportunity for him to just wander around and finally get to know this place he’s now supposed to call home.

Theed Palace is half a residence, half a museum-slash-memorial in tribute to the Amidala Royal Family and the Naberrie family that came before it, an exciting adventure for the kid who’s always loved reading the plaques in museums and finding out the stories behind severe faces in oil paintings. This part is all Leia, his father used to grumble whenever he’d beg to go to the local museum at every single town or city they’d visit on their annual father-son road trips, only to give Ben a fond smile and affectionately ruffle his hair as he exclaimed over some long-dead king or crumbling artifact.

Lost in fond memories, Ben doesn’t realize he must’ve made a wrong turn at some point until he reaches a dead end that is decidedly not the royal gallery. The hallway he finds himself in is quite cramped compared to the rest of the palace, and the wall is adorned only by a black shroud.

He should backpedal, should retrace his steps and get back to the original plan of memorizing the lives and names of the monarchs who came before him. But curiosity drives him forward, and it feels almost like an out-of-body experience as Ben watches his hand push aside the shroud to reveal an ornate tapestry of a royal couple on their wedding day.

There are no plaques here, no names, but he doesn’t need any help to recognize his maternal grandparents. Queen Padmé is radiant even when rendered in embroidery, but her husband looms behind her like a storm cloud, a tragic piece of foreshadowing that even now, decades after all that death and chaos and grief, so many still believe the queen should have picked up on.

To the historians and the survivors, Anakin Skywalker was a villain from the start, a duplicitous man who snaked his way into the young queen’s heart only to bring the royal family down from the inside, nearly tearing the country apart when he claimed the throne for himself after his wife’s untimely death instead of relinquishing control to the royal council until the next Amidala heir came of age.

But Ben looks at his grandfather, immortalized in silk thread on his wedding day, and sees only a man in love. Out of place, perhaps, and visibly uncomfortable, but the look in his eyes, the smile on his lips… Ben reaches out without quite knowing why, until a trembling hand hovers just a millimeter away from his grandfather’s blue eyes, bright and clear and happy–

He doesn’t realize he’s leaning forward until he loses his balance, palms reaching out in an attempt to steady himself against the wall behind the tapestry.

A hollow thunk seems to echo endlessly in this empty space, and Ben takes one last look at his grandparents before he carefully brushes the heavy tapestry aside and ducks into the narrow opening only to find–

“A secret door?” He sounds equal parts excited and wary even to his own ears, one hand reaching out to undo a slightly rusted old-fashioned door latch even as his heart races in trepidation. Technically, it’s not like he’s doing anything wrong. His mother had asked him to explore the palace all he wants, after all, and hadn’t expressly forbidden him from any part of it. But on the other hand, someone must have made a conscious decision to hide this door behind the shroud – perhaps even his mother herself, and probably for good reason.

Ben wars with himself as the door slowly creaks open, torn between the rush of an unexpected adventure and this deep-seated instinct to avoid anything that runs even the slightest risk of displeasing his mother. It’s different, with her. With his father he knows for a fact that nothing is unforgivable, that Han will always love him no matter what stupid shit he does. But with Leia… he’d disappointed her so much, those first few weeks after the truth had come out, and the fear that any and every mistake could be the last straw, that this could be the thing that finally convinces her that the awkward kid who grew up in grease-stained clothing isn’t fit to be her son and heir after all – that fear still lingers, no matter how hard he tries to get rid of it.

“–cannot let an outsider–”

Sound travels from beyond the doorway, faint but still audible.

“He is my son–”

That’s his mother’s voice.

“Order!”

And is that… a gavel?

Ben’s always been a curious kid, always been the kind to research historical figures and puzzle out old engines and try to find answers to all his questions – and this time is no different. His curiosity sufficiently piqued, he whispers a quiet apology to his mother and steps past the threshold, tugging the door shut behind him.

It’s not completely dark inside what he quickly identifies as a stone passageway, hidden motion sensors activating small pinpricks of light just bright enough to illuminate the path ahead as he moves closer and closer to the voices. There seems to be a light at the end of the tunnel, literally, and less than a minute later Ben finds himself face to face with what appears to be… a vent? One that looks directly into the chamber of parliament, he realizes as a robed figure hobbles closer to Speaker Ackbar.

“All blood relations and sentimentality aside,” the man sneers, and the disdain in that thin, weak voice could only belong to one person. “The fact remains that Prince Benjamin is a stranger to his own country, his own people, while my granddaughter has dedicated her entire life to serving her fellow Nabooians.”

“Lord Palpatine,” the speaker hurries to jump in before Leia can retort, and even from his vantage point high above them all Ben can see the way his mother is trembling with rage, her usual composure nowhere to be found.

All because of him, all because she’s defending her son against every single member of parliament.

“While I grant that the marchioness is a beloved daughter of Naboo and very popular among her peers, the fact remains that there is no valid reason to undercut Prince Benjamin’s claim to the throne. Unless the prince chooses to follow in his uncle’s footsteps and abdicate, I see no legitimate path to the throne for your granddaughter.”

His mother steps forward. “I can assure you that my son has no intention of abandoning the people of Naboo. He has poured years of effort and energy into preparing himself to be the best ruler this country can possibly ask for, and come this winter he will be succeeding me as the next Amidala monarch–”

“Unless,” Palpatine steps forward, his movements measured and surefooted in a way Ben has never known them to be, and that alone is enough to send a chill down his spine. There’s a reason this man has stuck around long enough to torment two – now three, apparently – generations of Amidala royals, and Ben is beginning to see that as a slow smile stretches across the old man’s gaunt, paper-thin skin. “Unless the people choose otherwise.”

Parliament is set ablaze by the idea, frantic whispers spreading like wildfire amongst the gathered crowd. Even his mother and Lord Ackbar, two of the most unflappable people Ben knows, are slow to respond.

“Lord Palpatine, what exactly are you suggesting?” the speaker finally asks, voice trembling with poorly-concealed trepidation.

And just before Palpatine turns to face Ackbar, there’s a moment when Ben swears their eyes meet through the narrow slits of the vent and the old man’s grin grows wider.

“I invoke the right to the people’s vote,” he declares, and all hell breaks loose.

“I thought this is supposed to be a monarchy, not a democracy!” Ben huffs, tugging at his hair until the roots hurt.

“Well technically, it’s a constitutional monarchy, which means–”

“I know what a constitutional monarchy is, mom!” He regrets snapping at her the second he does, and immediately ceases his pacing to sit by his mother’s side and take her hand. “I’m sorry, I just–”

Leia places her free hand on top of his and gives him a reassuring squeeze. “You’re frustrated,” she says. “Trust me, I am too. Every time I think our family has finally managed to escape that… that zombie’s claws, he always finds some kind of loophole to make life difficult for us.”

Ben slumps into the sofa that’s a little too firm to be comfortable, all the fight draining out of his body. “So it’s true, then? The people’s vote really exists?”

His mother sighs. “I had Threepio and Kaydel look into it. It hasn’t been invoked in centuries, but it’s true that this is how Naboo used to settle challenges to the throne whenever two or more legitimate heirs had equally valid claims. I suppose I can see the reason for it, a popular vote is much more efficient than war–”

It’s a great and civilized way of working things out, sure, but Ben’s not really interested in discussing the merits of letting the people choose their favored royal after what essentially amounts to a year-long popularity contest. “Keyword: valid claims. How can a marchioness challenge the crown prince’s claim to the throne? In what world is that valid?”

“Well, for one thing, the Palpatines are right behind the Amidalas in the line of succession, as they have been ever since the Naberrie line split into two branches five hundred years ago, and since you’re the only legitimate Amidala heir right now that makes her second in line.”

Ben drums his free hand against a cream-colored throw pillow next to him. “Okay, so she’s technically royal too, but there’s a line and I’m ahead of her. Why does she get the opportunity to skip ahead?”

His mother draws a deep breath, and settles her hands back into her lap. “Ben, you know Palpatine will say and do anything to get what he wants...”

Right, that whole outsider thing. Maybe what stings the most is the fact that the old zombie, as Leia just called him, isn’t even lying or stretching the truth. Ben really is an outsider here, raised and educated in the Core Republic with only a few weeks in Naboo here and there scattered throughout.

“Is that… is that what everyone else thinks, too?” he asks quietly, consciously deciding not to look his mother in the eye for this one. “That I’m just some stranger who doesn’t belong?”

Leia immediately reaches for his hand. “It doesn’t matter what anyone thinks, you do belong here, Ben,” she says fiercely, leaving no room for argument or doubt. “This is your home, and honestly, I believe most Nabooians would agree with me. It’s just that…” Here she falters, because this is where it gets complicated. Sure, he has a nominal claim to belonging, but– “Rey is… Well, she’s actually quite lovely, all things considered. And of course, she’s had her whole life to earn the love and respect of the people.”

Ben scoffs, feeling perhaps a little less charitable than he should with the memory of last night still so fresh in his mind. “I bet it’s all just an act. And you know what?” He lets the memory of her sweet smile curling into a smirk fuel him, draws upon his anger and revulsion at her grandfather to give him strength. “If that’s the game they want to play, then fine.” Palpatine and his granddaughter might view growing up in the Core Republic as some kind of weakness, but getting beers with constituents and kissing random babies was practically invented by Core politicians. Ben thinks maybe it’s high time for him to start drawing upon all his strengths rather than letting himself be shamed for them.

He will not be the one to let five hundred years of Amidala reign come to an end, to disappoint his mother and shame his family and fail his ancestors.

“This is war,” he decides out loud, and lets the declaration sink into his bones.

Leia pats his hand once more before she draws herself up, shoulders straight and head held high. “I’m glad to see you fighting for your birthright, Ben,” she tells him, and the pride in her eyes is all he needs to know he’s made the right decision.

“But do try and keep it civil while we’re all living under the same roof, please.”

And with that, his mother sweeps out of her sitting room with a grace befitting the queen she is, leaving a sputtering Ben to chase after her. “The same roof? What do you mean, the same roof?”

“I’ve invited the marchioness to come spend the summer with us, of course,” Leia informs him with a delicate shrug, as if they’re not talking about having the woman who’s attempting to steal the throne from them over as a houseguest. “She’s scheduled to arrive in, oh, ten minutes or so.”

“Jesus Christ, mom, why would you–”

Leia tosses him a sharp smile over her shoulder, never once faltering in her steps. “Because, Ben, this is war. And in war you keep your friends close, and your enemies closer.”

She floats down the stairs leading to the main entrance without a care in the world while Ben remains frozen in his tracks. “Oh my god, my mother is an evil genius,” he mutters to himself, not quite sure what to do with this new information.

“Come along, Ben, we wouldn’t want to keep our guest waiting!”

It’s a good thing his mother insists on always being at least five minutes early to everything, because apparently Rey Palpatine adheres to the same royal rules on punctuality. She’s announced just as Ben skips down the last couple steps of the grand stairway, and he hangs back while his mother greets Rey with all the warmth in the world, bright smile and open arms and all.

This has always been his least favorite part of the job, all the pretending that is part and parcel of diplomacy, but both his mother and Rey make it look effortless, the two of them embracing and chattering away like long-lost relatives.

It’s time for Ben to play along.

He tries being friendly for the first two weeks, his smile unwavering and his manners flawless as they share meals twice a day and run into each other again and again. It should be statistically unlikely for them to bump into each other so often in a palace this big, but Ben’s under no delusions that their run-ins are merely machinations of fate. The younger Palpatine, popular as she apparently is, surely has better things to do with her summer than to waste it cooped up in a palace with strangers. No, the only reason for her to be here is to spy on them, to identify their weaknesses and report back to her grandfather. So of course she’s everywhere he goes, always ready with a convenient excuse and a bit of small talk.

And the thing is, it wouldn’t even be that bad, if all they had to do was chit chat a bit every time they bump into each other. It’s been a fortnight since the ball, more than enough time for Ben to have boxed up whatever he felt for her that night and act completely normal around her. But the marchioness – Palpatine – Rey, Rey seems to know exactly how to push his buttons and get under his skin, and she does it all so effortlessly and elegantly it makes him see red.

Today, for instance, she just so happens to stumble upon him in the royal gallery, what a happy coincidence. She stands just close enough for him to feel the warmth of her body, to catch the familiar scent of her perfume, to realize that maybe he hadn’t done as thorough of a job boxing everything from that night up as he’d assumed. But other than the way his blood feels electrified in his veins by her mere proximity, this is fine. Perfectly fine. They’re just two people looking at paintings in silence… until she delivers her requisite barb.

“You know, there’s a pattern here in Naboo, when it comes to kings and queens,” Rey says, her voice deceptively light and casual as she trails one hand along the long wall covered in paintings of half a millennium’s worth of Amidala monarchs. Something flashes in her eyes when she turns to give him a brief glance before returning her attention to the portraits, and he catches the beginnings of a satisfied smirk tugging at her parted lips. “Our queens are always beloved, but our kings… now those we’ve always had rotten luck with.”

In the grand scheme of things, this is nothing compared to some of her previous jabs. It’s historically accurate, even, but for some reason this is the straw that breaks the camel’s back and sends him storming over to her, eliminating the safe distance he’s kept between them ever since the day she arrived.

“What the hell did I ever do to you? How can you hate a stranger this much?”

He snaps out of it somewhat when he notices the way Rey instinctively steps back from his sudden approach, nearly stumbling as she flinches away from him. It’s a subtle reaction, as controlled as everything else about her is, but Ben notices. He notices everything about her, even when he doesn’t want to, and the realization angers him all over again even as he tries to get himself under control, to rein himself in physically even if he’s a mess emotionally.

For her part, Rey seems genuinely taken aback. She stares at him wild-eyed until both of them have settled somewhat, harsh breaths stabilizing into deliberately slow and steady inhales, and then approaches him with tentative movements that are a far cry from the self-assurance she usually carries herself with.

“Ben,” she whispers, and somehow conveys remorse and sympathy with just that single syllable of his name. “Ben, I don’t hate you.”

His heart starts thudding so hard it hurts, the first flutters of hope stirring in his chest where they’ve remained dormant since the ball. “You… you don’t?”

Her smile is small and bittersweet, nothing like the genuine, unmistakable expression of joy that had so captivated him the night they met, but no less beautiful to him. God, he really is a mess.

“I don’t hate you,” Rey assures him, and just when he thinks this might be the start of something, might actually mean something, she delivers the killing blow. “I just don’t think you’re right for my people.”

Was this woman brought into existence for the sole purpose of giving him whiplash? As self-centered as that thought might be, Ben can’t help but give it serious consideration. First she takes his breath away only to reveal that she’s the granddaughter of his family’s sworn enemy, and now she fills him with hope only to crush him in the palm of that small, delicate hand, the one that’d fit so perfectly in his during their first and last dance.

Wrapped up as he is in this confusing tangle of events, he can barely come up with a response to her devastating words. “Your people?” It’s the first thing his mind latches onto, yet another reminder that no matter how hard he tries to belong here, he just doesn’t.

“My people,” Rey doubles down, tilting her chin up in a silent dare. Ben can’t challenge her claim, not really, but he can glare at her until she’s the first to blink, to give in and fill the tense silence between them. “Look,” she sighs, turning her back on him to wander further down the wall of portraits, past one Amidala and another and another until finally she comes to the Naberries – their shared ancestors, their shared claim to the throne.

Five hundred years puts a genetic distance of at least fifteen but most likely twenty-five generations between them, making them so far removed from each other it barely counts – Ben had checked the very night of the ball, as soon as he’d remembered that the Palpatines are more than just a thorn in the side of the Amidalas, that they’d shared a common ancestor five hundred years ago.

He’s snapped out of his reverie by his not-cousin when she turns to throw him a brief glance over her shoulder, looking almost apologetic. “It’s nothing personal, I promise.”

Oh, right – cousins or not, there’s still the matter of her believing he’s unfit for the throne she’d like to steal from right under his nose.

“It’s just, well,” Rey shrugs, pausing before a portrait of the last Naberrie queen, “I was born here, I grew up here, I’ve spent nearly my whole life here.”

And you did not. It goes unsaid, but only because it’s so obvious that a reminder is unnecessary. “I’ve dedicated everything to the people of Naboo,” she continues, and if he hadn’t already figured out how good of an actress she is Ben might’ve been moved by the passion in her voice. “I’ve held their hands in times of sorrow and danced with them in times of joy, I’ve walked with them through thick and thin, I’ve been there for the highs and the lows. And now here comes this outsider, who didn’t even want the throne to begin with–”

His sharp inhale seems to echo off the brocade walls and vaulted ceiling of the gallery, and Ben barely suppresses a wince as Rey turns to face him once more.

“How do you– Who told you that?” he demands, hoping to hide just how much she’s thrown him off balance with that little nugget of information he’d hoped would stay buried in his past.

Rey smiles, but there’s nothing sharp or victorious about it, nothing like the gotcha smirk he’d expected. Instead she looks almost… fond. “Your father paints a vivid story of teenage you, slipping on a puddle of engine grease while begging for someone, anyone to tell you this is all a dream.”

Ben barely ever gets angry at his father anymore these days, hasn’t really lost his temper at Han since… well, since the day he found out his entire life had been a lie at the age of sixteen, but this might prove to be just the thing to end that streak. “Why the fuck would he– what was he thinking– I’m going to–”

Caught up in a storm of betrayal and anger and embarrassment, he brushes past Rey without a second thought to go stalk off in search of his idiotic father– only to be stopped by slender fingers reaching out for him, just barely wrapping around his wrist.

It burns, where they touch, and Rey drops his hand as soon as their eyes meet.

She looks up at him from under lowered lashes, and somehow the move lacks the calculated coyness he’s sensed from other women of the court when they deploy this age-old trick. “If it’s any consolation, that anecdote was just one small part of a larger story in which he tried to convince me of how much things have changed since then. How much you have changed.”

Great. Now he feels like an asshole for instantly doubting his father and he’s made a fool of himself in front of her. That doesn’t matter, Ben has to remind himself. What she thinks about him doesn’t matter, because–

“You don’t buy it.”

To his surprise, Rey shakes her head. “Ben, I truly do believe you want to be a good king. I just…” He knows it’s coming, the inevitable but that always follows her sweet words, that killing blow all their conversations end with, and she does not disappoint. “I just don’t think you can be, not with one foot constantly out the door, thinking of your other life.”

His first instinct is to protest, to come up with some sort of dishonest defense to salvage things, but Rey isn’t done. She draws in a deep breath and squares her shoulders, standing tall under his scrutiny, and delivers her parting words. “Naboo deserves to come first to its ruler, above all else – above family, above friends, above happiness. That’s why I’m prepared to give everything to this country. Can you say the same?”

It’s not a rhetorical question, not an attack, not even a challenge. It’s a question, plain and simple, and one she’s kind enough to deliver sincerely and gently. Ben thinks maybe that’s what throws him off more than anything – the way Rey’s wide eyes seem to almost implore him to prove her wrong, as if she genuinely wishes he could say the same.

He wishes he could, too. But there’s no hiding from the truth when the silence between them stretches out until he feels like he could suffocate in this vast cavern filled with the watchful and disapproving eyes of his ancestors, until he feels like he could choke on the awful truth that he’s finally come face-to-face with.

Rey, for all her failings, is kind enough not to make him say it out loud. The smile she gives him is tinged with regret, with pity, and it says everything she chooses not to give voice to as she walks away, leaving him to wrestle with the truth all on his own.

They keep their distance from each other after that day in the gallery, even as they’re relentlessly thrown together for public appearances and dinner parties and summer events. It doesn’t help that Rose, one of his few real friends here in Naboo, genuinely seems to like spending time with Rey. Ben knows for a fact that Rose is an excellent judge of character, and seeing her take to Rey so quickly and happily only adds to the conflict brewing within him. He expects things to get better when the other young nobles return from their studies abroad or island getaways to partake in the palace’s festivities for the season, only to find out that apparently every single goddamn person their age adores Rey, including Rose’s friends Finn and Poe.

All of this to say that by the time his mother’s annual summer picnic rolls around, Ben is a ticking time bomb that’s just one lit match away from blowing up – and if the match just so happens to involve embarrassing himself in front of literal millions of people, well… of course it would. That’s just the kind of summer this is, apparently.

The day starts out well enough – any event that doesn’t require a full three-piece suit and tie is a win in his book, and the fact that he’s not expected to give a speech further sweetens the deal. Even the reminder that he’s scheduled for a few brief interviews with members of the press can’t sour his mood, not until the last interviewer – Dopheld Mitaka, from the online outlet TheedFeed – decides it might be fun and different to have both him and Rey on at the same time for his livestream of the event.

It’s not an instant disaster – they’re professionals, after all, and at this point they’ve spent nearly a month ignoring each other by day and making cordial small talk at dinner. They sail through questions about their favorite dishes served at the picnic, favorite flowers currently in bloom here at the palace, favorite part of the event (this one they agree on – Paige Tico’s lovely voice is incomparable). By the time Mitaka announces that they’ve reached the final segment of the interview, Ben is foolish enough to actually think that this might not be so bad after all.

Because the universe just loves to prove him wrong, the final segment turns out to be a pop quiz on nonsensical Nabooian sayings about summer, all of them in the native language that’s largely fallen out of use – the one his mother had assured him he wouldn’t have to worry about, the one Rey is apparently very fluent in. It’s something of an out-of-body experience, watching her switch into the language and even crack jokes with Mitaka while Ben just stands there, the panic in his eyes clear as day and his utter silence unmistakably damning.

The ringing in his ears nearly drowns out the sound of Mitaka thanking them both for their time and wrapping up the interview, and Ben holds it together for just long enough to walk out of view before he’s cursing and running away, heedless of the gasps and whispers he leaves in his wake.

The palace grounds are vast, too vast for him to have fully explored in his brief time here, but there’s one place he can always find his way to. The sight of the royal stables fills him with relief, and he heads straight for his closest and oldest friend in all of Naboo.

“Hey, boy,” he mumbles, heading straight for the sable stallion who perks his head up at the sound of Ben’s voice.

Grimtaash had been a surprise gift from his mother that first summer he came to visit, and is perhaps the only thing he truly misses about this place when he’s gone.

God, Rey is right – Naboo really does deserve better than him. It deserves someone who doesn’t just treat this place like a summer destination, who actually cares enough to learn the language, who–

“Hi.”

Standing in the doorway of the stables, silhouetted by the summer sun in her pretty, gauzy dress, Rey doesn’t just look like the queen she’s meant to be.

She looks like a goddess.

Ben grimaces at the reminder of his hopeless, misplaced, and unrequited crush. “Hey,” he mutters in return, rubbing a heavy hand over his face as Rey walks closer. She picks up a couple of carrots from a nearby bin as she passes by, and offers the first to Grimtaash.

His horse can be a bit jumpy around others, especially strangers, but somehow it doesn’t surprise Ben one bit when Grimtaash gently nips the carrot from Rey’s hand and lowers his head for a pet. Rey obliges him with a pleased little laugh, running her fingers through his smooth coat before she turns her attention to a pretty white mare in the stall next to Grimtaash, one he doesn’t remember seeing around.

“Her name is Dosmit,” Rey tells him quietly after handing the mare her second carrot, and he watches as she affectionately presses her forehead to the horse’s. “I had her brought over when your mother insisted I stay for the rest of the summer. We don’t like being left behind, Dosmit and I.”

She doesn’t elaborate, and he doesn’t push. After all, Ben knows all too well what it’s like to have past wounds that are still too fresh to poke at.

“That’s a… unique name for a horse,” he offers, not unkindly.

Rey laughs as she picks up a brush and starts grooming Dosmit. “It’s a weird name for anything and anyone, I know. But it was the name of my first doll, the only thing I had left of my parents after the fire.”

He’s heard the stories, of course – the Palpatine summer estate burnt down to ashes while Sheev was away on business and Rey was at camp, her parents along with it. There are whispers, rumors, theories about the tragedy – about the timing of it all, about the way they were found in their bedroom as if they’d never even tried to escape, about how Palpatine had them buried immediately and refused any request for an autopsy or toxicology.

“I…” It’d be rude not to say something, but everything he’s learned about Rey thus far tells him she doesn’t want his condolences, his pity, his empty apologies for something that had nothing to do with him. She shrugs it off before he can figure out what to say, and Ben feels like a selfish wretch for the relief that washes through him at that.

“Let’s go for a ride,” Rey suggests with a bright smile that almost reaches her eyes, and even after everything they’ve been through, he still can’t say no to that smile.

They ride to the very edges of the palace grounds, sticking to a wooded trail that hides them from lingering guests and watchful cameras, until they reach a lake he’s yet to discover. Rey teaches him how to skip stones while their horses graze, teaches him how to start a fire when the sun sets and a cold front blows in from the sea, teaches him about all the constellations and their Nabooian stories when the stars come out and they lie side by side on their backs.

“Which one’s your favorite?” Ben finally finds the courage to ask at some point, long after Rey started weaving stories of fickle gods and brave heroes, and there’s something almost like surprise in her eyes when she turns to look at him, their heads so close he can feel her breathing. 

“My favorite?” she asks, eyes searching his as if no one’s ever thought to ask her that, ever cared enough to ask.

His heart aches for her at the realization, and he thinks back to everything he’s ever heard about the Palpatines, all the whispers that paint a cold and dark picture entirely unbefitting – unworthy – of warm and sunny Rey.

She deserves so much better.

“Your favorite,” he affirms, and watches as the surprise in her eyes turns into unmistakable delight. A delight that soon spreads to him, warm as the touch of her fingers laced around his to raise their joined arms and point out a cluster of stars that vaguely form the outline of two hands reaching for each other.

“That one,” Rey says, sounding as breathless as he feels, and their hands remain linked even as she allows them to drop back to the ground. “It’s about the ancient warriors Bastila and Revan,” she tells him, and promptly launches into a tale of peace and war, of light and dark, of love and loss.

The moon has reached its apex in the sky by the time Rey wraps up her story. “He never came back, but all her life she insisted he was always right there with her. And the story goes that she died with a smile on her face, his name the last word on her lips as they were reunited.”

He doesn’t realize there are tears in his eyes until they hit his cheeks, and Rey lets out a quiet little laugh as she wipes away tears of her own.

“They…” Ben swallows the lump in his throat and draws a shaky breath. “They must have loved each other very much.”

“I believe so too.” Rey smiles, her eyes sparkling in the dark, and out here in the open, under the night sky, it feels like they could be the only two people in the world, like this moment is all that exists of them, all that matters to them. The longer he looks into her eyes, the longer he allows himself to believe in this dream world, the closer they grow, until he closes his eyes and gives in to the moment–

A whoosh of cold air hits him in the face, and he blinks to find Rey standing above him, brushing grass off her dress and looking out at the lake, the sky, the horses – anywhere but him. “We should head back.”

Their little world disappears as if it had never existed at all, and reality settles into his bones with a chill he knows he can’t chalk up to the cold night.

Whatever this is between them, whatever it could be – it can never happen, for a million and one reasons. Because they’re competing for the throne. Because their families hate each other. Because she thinks he’s a selfish person unworthy of the throne and… fuck, he’s beginning to think so too.

“Right,” Ben says gruffly, clearing his throat to hide the tremble in his voice, and pulls himself up to his feet. Rey doesn’t offer him a hand, doesn’t say another word, doesn’t even look at him.

They ride back separately.

She leaves the palace three days later, thanking the queen for her hospitality but insisting that she misses her grandfather and home too much to stay for the rest of the season. Ben watches from the top of the staircase, physically unable to move any closer to her.

Her lips part in a gasp when their eyes meet, and his heart skips a beat. They share a wordless moment, a look that captures everything that could have been and everything that never will be between them, and she leaves without saying goodbye.

Chapter Text

It doesn’t take long for the rumors to start, for everyone from his parents to Threepio to the media to realize that something is wrong with the prince who hardly ever smiles anymore.

Ben throws himself into every history lesson and etiquette class and public event, welcomes any and every distraction that comes his way and allows him to claim that he’s simply carrying out his duties and taking the competition seriously.

He spends what little free time his concerned mother forces him to have exploring the grounds, consciously giving the lake he’s come to think of as theirs a wide berth. There’s plenty of other spots to discover, a garden here and a statue there and even a nice little bench hidden in the middle of a hedge maze.

That last one becomes his favorite hideaway, until the day his father discovers it.

“So uh, you ready to talk about it yet, kid?” Han asks in his usual clumsy, gruff manner, and despite everything, Ben finds himself smiling at the familiarity of his father’s bluntness compared to the delicate way his mother and everyone else has been dancing around him.

He slides aside to make space for his father on the bench, a silent invitation Han immediately accepts. “Not really, no,” Ben says, simple as that, and knows his father will accept and respect it, accept and respect him.

Han does not disappoint, dropping the matter with nothing more than a shrug. “Whenever you’re ready, then. What’ve you been up to lately, anyway? Feels like I only see you when we’re stuffing our faces these days–”

A lump forms in Ben’s throat at his father’s blatant attempt to redirect the conversation, to respect his wishes and make him feel comfortable. It’s just… the familiarity of it all, the comfort of having his dad by his side and knowing he’s always here for Ben whenever he needs him, that he understands in a way no one else ever will, that he’s the last person who would ever judge– “Can you tell me how you and mom fell in love?” he suddenly blurts out, surprising the both of them.

And his father, Han the scruffy, gruffy man who’s never felt comfortable with mushy stuff, you know me, kid, that’s not my style, Han who looks visibly thrown by this request and maybe even a little awkward – his father immediately sees the desperate request for what it is, and gives in without a single question or even an attempt to protest.

“Well,” Han clears his throat and scratches at the back of one ear, a tell Ben hadn’t even realized he’d inherited from his dad until his mom pointed it out one day with a fond smile, “you know the basics – with Lando and Crimson Dawn and all that.”

That part he’s known for what feels like all his life, the rare piece of truth his father hadn’t felt the need to hide from him even when everything else was top secret. There’s nothing suspicious about two people meeting through a mutual friend, after all, even if his parents’ story is a bit more complicated than the average tale of being set up by a friend, by virtue of it involving an international man of mystery (his uncle Lando’s preferred description) being rescued from Corellia’s underground gambling ring by a reckless street racer and then flying said street racer to Naboo for a luxurious getaway as a thank-you.

When Ben was a kid, Han had described Leia as a childhood friend of Lando’s and left it at that, casually omitting the bit about her being royalty. He doesn’t bother this time, now that Ben knows all about that.

“I’ve gotta be honest with you, kid – I don’t think either of us were looking for anything serious at first. Chewie and I had a whole new life to figure out since we could never go back to Corellia, and your mom… well, your mom was about to reclaim her throne after two decades of council rule and become queen of a whole country. We both had bigger things to worry about.”

He forgets about that part, sometimes – forgets that his mother hasn’t always been this perfect and beloved queen, that at one point she herself had been a long-lost heir doing her best to fit in here, to prove herself worthy of her people’s trust and affection after her mother’s death and her father’s betrayal and the subsequent decades of political chaos had left all of Naboo wary of Skywalker blood.

But at least she’d always known the truth about her origins, at least she’d been raised as proper royalty by her adoptive parents in neighboring Alderaan. Ben wonders sometimes if he would’ve preferred that kind of advance warning and intense preparation, if it would’ve made things better or worse.

“Especially your mom. It was hard on her, leaving her home and adjusting to everything. I remember one time I told her–” Han laughs at the memory, shaking his head at his younger self. “I told her not to fall in love with me, and she said she didn’t have time for that in her busy schedule anyway.”

“But she found time,” Ben chimes in, knowing how this part of the story goes. He wouldn’t be here if she hadn’t, after all.

The smile on Han’s face transforms him into a different man entirely, younger and softer. “Yeah, she found time for this scoundrel. And oh boy, let me tell you: the locals were not happy.”

To say that the Nabooians had been wary of their new queen following in her mother’s footsteps and falling for an outsider would be the understatement of the century. Ben’s gone through the royal archives and read the old headlines, all of them predicting only pain and tragedy: History repeats itself! Tragedy strikes twice? The Mad King, Part 2.

“But after a while…” Han trails off with a shrug. “I mean– you know me, kid. I’ve never been good at pretending or hiding things. I guess they saw something in me whenever I was around your mother, and slowly they started coming around to us. And once you were born? It was all water under the bridge. The whole damn country was in love with you, with all the happiness and celebration your mother had brought to them in just a year, after all those years of mourning the last queen.”

Ben knows from his history lessons that the happiness was short-lived, that the first three years of his life were just the calm before the storm.

Before the insurrection.

Before the threats.

Before the bomb.

In the dead of night, with police and first responders still sorting through the smoking remains of Varykino, Leia had made the hardest decision of her life – and Han, heartbroken as he was, had supported her nonetheless.

“It killed her, you know,” his father sighs, knowing exactly where his thoughts have taken him. “Your mom, she never got to know her birthparents. And her brother was barely ever around – the council chose to split the twins up, to make it harder for their father to find them. The only family she ever knew, the Organas – she had to say goodbye to them to come here. And then just as she finally found a family of her own, just as we both thought things were going our way for once…”

His mother had appeared on national television the very night of the bombing, to announce that the separatists had succeeded in their attack, that both her husband and son had perished in the flaming ruins of the winter palace. And while all eyes were on the queen, Lando had snuck the young prince and his father out of the country and back into the republic, where Chewie helped them get set up in Chandrila.

Han scrubs at his face, and Ben pretends not to notice his father brushing away an errant tear. “It took her two years, did you know that? Two years before she could safely visit us. She cried when you didn’t recognize her, when you turned away from her to hide in my arms. Broke my heart to see that.”

There’s not much Ben remembers from his mother’s first visit – he’d only been five, after all, and understandably confused by the presence and then absence of the strange woman who sang him to sleep every single night she was there. What he does remember – and what he will never tell his parents – is the big fight they’d had the day Leia left, the day she chose her country over her family.

“Thirteen years, Ben. She was gone from our lives for thirteen years, with only – what, ten visits in between? And I know she had her reasons, I know we had to put your safety above everything else, but… it was hell on us, I won’t lie.”

Ben had been given a front-row seat to the slow dissolution of his parents’ marriage. Things would always start out so well, whenever his mother came to visit, and by the end of it there’d be yelling and crying and tense goodbyes, each of which always felt like it might be the last.

But in the end his mother always came back, and his father always greeted her with open arms. No matter how difficult things were, no matter how much hurt they shared between them – “But you never stopped loving each other,” Ben says, half an observation and half a question, “even when it wasn’t easy.”

His father scoffs, a laugh in the odd language that is Han Solo, and reaches out to ruffle Ben’s hair as if he’s five again. “Love never is, kid.”

He’s beginning to see that.

“Dad…” Ben hesitates, wonders how much of his heart he’s truly ready to reveal. But really, there’s no way to prove that he’s asking any of this with her in mind – or so he tells himself, even as his father stares him down with knowing eyes. “If you had to do it all over again, knowing how difficult it would be, knowing how much it would hurt–”

“In a heartbeat,” Han tells him, not a hint of hesitation or doubt in his voice. “No matter what we’ve been through, no matter what we’ll go through, I would do it all again in a heartbeat if it meant having her in my life.”

A moment passes between them, raw honesty in Han’s eyes and pure awe in Ben’s. And then his father, in true Awkward Solo fashion, clears his throat and looks away to signal the end of this particular mushy talk.

Ben gets to his feet and dusts himself off, carefully selecting his last words. “You, uh… you should tell her that.”

Han stands up as well, and they begin to make their way out of the maze. “Working on it, kid,” he mutters, his gruff exterior slowly sliding into place once more. But just before the moment fully passes them by– “You gonna take your own advice?” Han asks with a smirk, a challenge in his voice and encouragement in his eyes.

Ben shakes his head and laughs at himself for ever thinking he could’ve kept something this big from his dad. They’re too alike, father and son – right down to their romantic misadventures.

“Working on it, dad.”

A week into August, his mother comes up with an idea that is, depending on who you ask, either brilliant (Leia), fun (Han), or awful (Ben).

“Isn’t Varykino supposed to be a winter palace?” Ben asks in a doomed attempt to change his mother’s mind, hating how whiny his voice sounds even to his own ears. But really, how else is he supposed to react to her suggestion (read: gentle order) that he spend the last two weeks of summer vacationing with a bunch of young nobles in the house where his entire family was nearly murdered twenty years ago?

Leia waves dismissively, her eyes never once moving from the to-do list she’s currently reviewing.

“It’s just a leftover label from centuries ago, back when your idiot great-great-great-grandfather King Veruna insisted on having one palace for each season. There’s no reason a perfectly good house should go to waste for three-quarters of the year just because of one long-dead man’s greed.”

King Veruna – or Veruna the Corrupt, as the history books call him – is one of only a handful of Amidala kings, each of them more awful than the last. Unbidden, the memory of Rey’s little jab that day in the gallery returns to him – and with it, a fear he can no longer repress.

“Mom, am I going to be a bad king?”

Leia’s tablet clatters to the ground, but she doesn’t even seem to register the loss, her wide eyes fixed firmly on her son. “Oh, honey,” she coos, reaching across the dainty tea table for his hand. “Why would you think that?”

There are so many things he’d missed out on as a child, so many moments with his mother he’d imagined but never experienced. He’d been denied the comfort of a mother’s embrace the first time his classmates bullied him for his ears, the formative experience of shyly confiding in her as he experienced his first crush, the soothing balm of a mother’s love for a broken heart. So to have her here, now, reaching out with a kind voice and concerned eyes and all the patience in the world even though she has a million other things to do… is it any wonder that this is the moment the dam finally, finally breaks?

“I’m trying, mom, I promise, I’m trying so hard to feel at home here, but a part of me – a big part of me – still wishes that we could just leave, that I could have you back without all of this. And that’s unfair to you, I know, and it’s unfair to the people too, and I just… what if Rey was right? What if Naboo does deserve better than me? What if I’m being selfish, holding on to the crown instead of making way for her even though I know she’s a better fit than I am, all because I want to win, all because I want to… to…” He finally falters, this particular train of thought coming to a crashing halt as the inevitable endpoint reveals itself.

It’s not new to him, the true reason he’s still here, the reason he agreed to any of this in the first place, but to say it out loud for the very first time, to admit it to both his mother and himself, takes more out of Ben than he expected.

“To make you proud,” he confesses, eyes dropping to delicate flowers hand-painted onto the wooden tabletop to avoid his mother’s gaze. His shoulders sag with an unexpected surge of relief as soon as the words leave him - relief that the awful truth is finally out there, that he doesn’t have to keep it to himself anymore.

The silence that follows is heavy with possibilities, so many different ways this moment could play out, but there’s a kind of liberation, a kind of freedom, in letting go and willing the pieces to fall where they may, in stepping back and letting go of the reins.

He’s not even king yet, and already he’s tired of trying to be in control all the time.

“Ben…” his mother finally says, and he looks up to find her eyes shimmering with tears – tears that appear to be completely at odds with the smile she gives him. “I’ve always been proud of you. Always. My strong boy, I’ve put you through so much and yet–”

It never gets any easier, seeing his mother cry. He rushes out of his chair to kneel by hers, and goes willingly when Leia pulls him close to rest his head in her lap the way he never got to when he was a child. “I’ve always been proud of you,” she says again, “and I always will be, no matter what. But honey, if it’s any help – this country has had many bad kings, but I know in my heart that you won’t be one of them.”

“But mom,” he croaks, letting all of his vulnerabilities and fears seep into his voice, “how can you be so sure?”

Cool fingers seek out his chin and gently angle his head up to meet her reassuring smile, slow tears still rolling down her cheeks. “Ben, just the fact that you’re this worried about being a good king, the fact that you’re actually thinking of giving up the throne and walking away from all of this power and privilege so that Naboo can have a better ruler – you might not be king yet, but you’re already acting like one. A good one, who does right by his country even when it’s difficult. And…” Leia pauses for a moment, carefully weighing her next words. “About Rey – she’s a wonderful person, honey, with Naboo’s best interests at heart. But sometimes… sometimes her judgment can be clouded through no fault or flaw of her own.”

He pulls away from his mother to look her in the eye, trying to pick up clues to decipher her vague words. “What do you mean?”

Leia blinks, and suddenly her frown is replaced by a smile he recognizes from pictures and speeches, a smile she typically reserves for prying outsiders. “Oh, you know, none of us are perfect,” she says breezily, complete with a dismissive wave of her hand, and goes on to speak over Ben’s continued line of questioning. “Anyway, speaking of Rey – I’ve invited her to Varykino as well, of course. Maybe you two can finally have a proper talk about… whatever it is you still won’t tell me or your father, hmm?”

And just like that, he’s back in whiny teenager mode.

“Mom,” he grumbles, dragging the single syllable out into something closer to five.

His mother laughs and reaches out to ruffle his hair. “First lesson of being a ruler: you can’t run away from things, Ben. Now go and figure out a solution to this like the proper king you are, all right?”

At least she’s kind enough to phrase it like a question, even though they both know it’s anything but. The thought of seeing Rey again, of sharing a roof with her once more and restraining himself to polite small talk during mealtimes and passing by her in hallways as if they’re mere acquaintances… it’s too much for him to deal with right now, and so he doesn’t.

He might not be able to run away from things indefinitely, but surely he’s allowed to procrastinate for a bit. “I still don’t get why I need to go spend two weeks with people I don’t even know that well,” he mutters instead, and Leia gives him a knowing look but lets him steer them away from the topic of Rey anyway.

She reaches for his hand and gives it a squeeze, her touch stern yet affectionate. “The crown is heavy, my son, too heavy for even the strongest of rulers to bear alone. Foolish kings doom themselves by thinking they can shoulder the weight on their own. But wise kings… wise kings surround themselves with people they can trust to share the burden.”

Trust his mother to disguise a lesson in ruling as a summer getaway.

“There will come a time, not so long from now, when you will have to form a council of your own. And I’m not saying you have to pick any of these people, Ben – you will know best how to form your own council, just as I formed my own without bending to the wills and wishes of others. But do me a favor and don’t write any of these kids off just yet, all right?”

And so he agrees to go to Varykino, even as his unfinished business with Rey threatens to cast a long shadow over the final days of summer.

Rey arrives two days after the rest of them, giving Ben’s imagination plenty of time to run wild and conjure worst-case scenarios of their reunion. Will they be able to maintain the charade of being casual friends, as he is with Poe and Finn? Will they go back to the hostility of their earliest days? Worst of all, will she bring someone else with her?

Reality is somehow more painful than the nightmarish possibilities that have had him tossing and turning at night for the past week. The spark in her eyes, it’s vanished without a trace, as if it was never there. The little smirk that would send blood rushing through his veins, the infectious laughter that could fill a ballroom, the woman behind the title and trappings of aristocracy that she’d allowed him to glimpse – all of that is gone, replaced by a picture-perfect marchioness: unfailingly polite but painfully distant, quiet and withdrawn around all of them and especially him, a perfect stranger wearing the face of the woman who’d shown him how to navigate the hidden secrets of the night sky.

She calls him Your Highness.

She doesn’t speak to him unless spoken to.

She won’t even look at him.

And maybe, just maybe, Ben’s never known true heartache until now, until her. She consumes his every waking moment even though it’s clear he no longer holds even a shred of her attention, keeps him wide awake at night even though he knows he has no place in her dreams, holds his heart in her dainty, distant hands without even knowing it.

He can’t even muster the energy to be embarrassed by the way everyone else tiptoes around the subject of him and Rey, picking up on the tension he carries with him now like an extension of his self. Jannah, normally so quick to tease him about any girl who so much as wins a second look from him, keeps their conversations focused solely on their fathers’ hijinks. Poe and Finn, far closer to Rey than they are to him, make no mention of her whenever the three of them find themselves left to their own devices. And Rose, for all the curious looks she sends his way, refrains from even a single probing question.

They’re good people, this collection of friends and acquaintances he’d been so quick to dismiss before his conversation with his mother. She’ll be pleased to know that she was right about them, as she always is. Maybe Ben will even broach the topic of how one begins to form a council when he gets back to Theed Palace.

But first he has to make it through the rest of this so-called summer vacation, which promises to feel like an eternity. He gives up on sleep by the fourth night, choosing instead to wander around the unfamiliar palace in search of a library or gallery or perhaps even another secret door.

What he stumbles upon instead is an unexpected sliver of light that leads him to an ajar door, beyond which he can barely make out a glimpse of Rey and Rose and… crying.

Rey’s crying.

His heart shatters at the sound of her heaving sobs muffled into Rose’s nightshirt, every single cell of his body at war with his conscience. He knows he should walk away, knows it would be wrong to eavesdrop, but it’s a battle unlike any other to ignore the need to go to her, to hold and comfort her. He makes it as far as the reading room at the end of the hallway, unable to walk away from her entirely, and tells himself it’s not his fault that sound travels in this old house, that he can hear her even from two doors away.

“I just, I don’t know what to do,” she says again and again, and each time the sound of her helpless voice feels like a knife through his heart. Words keep pouring out of her as Rose continues to soothe her, quiet, comforting sounds punctuating each revelation from Rey.

“Everything my grandfather told me… none of it is true, Rose. I was so ready to hate him, to save Naboo from him–”

Ben waits with bated breath as he strains to make out the next few sentences shared between the two women, to ascertain Rey’s verdict on him. Because somewhere along the line hers became the opinion that matters the most, somehow despite everything hers is still the approval he desperately needs before he can move forward.

And when she finally bestows it upon him, his heart soars.

“I think– I know he’ll make a wonderful king, I know he cares about our people as much as I do.”

He nearly leaps out of his chair before his mind can catch up to his body, before he can remind himself that she hasn’t chosen to share any of this with him, that she’s only chosen to lock him out. Ben composes himself and rests his hands on his shaking knees, willing his legs to stay still and not carry him to her.

“But?” Rose prompts, endlessly patient and supportive.

Rey’s sniffles sound sharp in the dead of night, echoing off high ceilings and long hallways. “But when I told my grandfather…” she hesitates, and every muscle in his body tenses at the mention of Palpatine, at the thought of what he might have said – or done – to Rey for daring to go against him.

Rose, it seems, shares his fears. “Rey, are you okay? What did he do to you?”

His hands curl into fists, and the pause between Rose’s question and Rey’s answer is nigh unbearable, anger and dread coursing through his veins until–

“It’s not what he did, Rose. It’s what he said,” Rey finally says, her words hard to make out through another painful sob. “He… he called me a traitor, a failure. And if I go through with it, if I take myself out of the running… he’s going to send me away.”

There’s more after that, Rey explaining that she has nothing of her own and would have no choice but to leave if her grandfather ordered her to, but Ben can barely process any of that as his ears begin to ring and his entire body goes numb.

Away.

That rotting, decrepit asshole thinks he can send Rey away from her own home, from the one place she loves more than anything in the world?

He should be more mindful of this, given the trail of dead bodies everyone suspects Palpatine has left in his wake, but Ben decides then and there that over his dead body will anyone send Rey away from Naboo. He’ll call his mother first thing in the morning, hell he’ll call his uncle Lando and ask for a less-than-legal favor if he has to, he’ll confront that monster himself–

“The thought of leaving all of you, of leaving Ben…”

The sound of his name on her lips for the first time in ages, however muffled, is the only thing that can break him out of his murderous thoughts. And all plans for threats, for violence, instantly leave his mind as he tries to keep up with the unexpected direction Rey’s conversation has gone in.

“Rey…” Rose says slowly, carefully. “What exactly happened between you two?”

He wonders what she’ll tell Rose about them, what she thinks about them. Did that night mean anything to her? Did any of it? And if she says nothing happened, if she can brush them aside just like that, will he still be able to sit across from her at breakfast tomorrow and pretend that everything is all right?

In the end, she says nothing.

“I should… I should get some sleep,” Rey announces out of the blue, and he’s struck by a moment of déjà vu, his mind helpfully supplying that memory of her suddenly shutting him out under the watchful gaze of her beloved stars. He remembers with aching clarity the way she wouldn’t meet his eyes, the way she seemed to curl in on herself as if to disappear, the way every step away from him felt like an irreparable rift.

Rose’s protests are gentle, trying to coax her to stay even if she won’t open up, but he knows better than anyone that there’s no making Rey stay once she’s determined to leave. “I’ll see you in the morning, Rose,” she says, and Rose bids her good night with a defeated sigh as the door creaks and then shuts behind Rey.

By the time he remembers that he’d left the door cracked open – for ventilation, of course, and nothing else – and that Rey is sure to notice the light spilling out from the reading room, it’s too late.

He leaps to his feet only to find her looking him in the eye for the first time in weeks, and that’s all it takes for his heart to start pounding like a hummingbird’s, a wild and painful flutter barely contained by his chest.

“How much of that did you hear?”

There’s no denying it then, not that he would’ve been able to lie to her in the first place. But the truth, as his mother once taught him, is a matter of degrees. That he overheard her conversation is undeniable, but how much of his truth does he entrust to her? How much of the emotional turmoil brewing within him can he reveal?

All of it, his heart decides before his mind can even begin to consider any other choice, any safer choice, and the truth claws its way out of his throat as if it can’t bear to be kept from her any longer. “Enough to make me wish I’d said something the day you left, anything to make you stay and keep you away from him.”

They seem equally taken aback when she steps past the threshold and comes closer, as if she’d expected his words to send her running in the opposite direction too.

But she stays instead, she stays, and prods him for more with one single word that proves to be the key to everything. “Why?”

And this is it, Ben knows, the moment there is no coming back from, the moment that he’ll either look back on with regret or reverence for the rest of his life.

“Because I can’t stand the thought of anyone hurting you.”

Rey chokes on a sob, barely muffled by the shaking hand she’s brought to her lips, and he can’t fight his instincts any longer. He closes the distance between them within seconds, and then finally, at long last, Rey is in his arms, holding onto him like a lifeline as he tucks her head under his chin and wraps his arms around her waist.

He’s shaking, and she’s crying, and it’s nothing like the dozens of dreams he’s had of this moment – but it’s real, and it’s her, and that’s all he needs.

“Ben,” she cries into his shirt, hot tears pooling in the hollow of his clavicle, “I don’t know what to do.”

“We’ll figure it out together,” he promises her without a second’s hesitation, knowing that there is nothing on earth that could make him abandon her now that she’s finally letting him in.

Rey lifts her head to look at him with scared, mournful eyes. “He’ll come after you.”

As if Palpatine hadn’t decided to come after him on the very day he was born. At least now Ben knows what he’s fighting for, beyond a crown and a legacy he’s only ever protected out of a sense of duty. “I’m not scared.”

She looks at him for the longest moment, searching his eyes for something he can’t quite figure out but knows she will find. Whatever she’s looking for, whatever she needs from him – it’s hers.

“Am I really worth all this?” Rey finally whispers, and it breaks his heart how small and scared her voice sounds, as if she genuinely believes his answer might be anything but a resounding yes.

“All this and so much more, sweetheart,” he vows, willing her to hear in that promise the three little words he won’t burden her with just yet, not when she’s already going through so much.

Ben is fully aware of how cheesy this is, of how ridiculous he is around this woman, but there’s no denying that when she finally smiles, his first thought is of sunrise. And when he gets to feel that smile pressed against his lips, when he gets to taste her joy as she kisses him for the very first time, his first thought – as disturbing as it might sound, out of context – is of his father. He thinks of his father that day in the maze, of how Han didn’t even hesitate when he said he would do it all over again. Despite all the pain he and Leia have been through, despite the uncertainty of their future, despite everything, he would always pick her.

And after a lifetime of trying to make sense of that kind of love, Ben finally understands.

He wakes up with Rey warm and smiling and safe in his arms, like something out of a dream.

The moment doesn’t last long, her sleepy smile faltering as she slowly blinks her way back into the waking world and all the dangers that await them, but it’s still a memory he knows he’ll cherish until the day he dies.

Loathe to burst their bubble, Ben remains quiet as Rey stares into his eyes, tracing idle patterns into the soft, warm skin of her hip as he waits for her to break the silence.

She curls into his side, her head fitting perfectly in the curve between his neck and shoulder. “If anything happens to you because of me…” she whispers, her voice scratchy with sleep.

It’s unexpectedly intimate, this knowledge of what she sounds like first thing in the morning, and he holds onto that thought even as the implications of her words slowly dawn on him.

“Do you really think he’s capable of that?” He’s careful to keep his voice steady, to show no sign of fear or regret. No matter what Palpatine throws their way from here on out, he won’t have Rey think for even a moment that she’s not worth it, that he’s not completely and utterly sure of his decision to fight for her.

Rey pushes up on one arm, and he’s treated to the juxtaposition of her cheek smushed against the palm of her hand while she looks down at him with her features set in a grim mask. He might have found it cute, if not for her next words.

“I know he’s capable of so much worse,” she says quietly, and he’s reminded once more of all the rumors surrounding the Palpatine family, of her parents’ mysterious death.

That day in the stables, he hadn’t known what to say, what to do. On this beautiful morning, bathed in golden sunlight despite the shadows the outside world threatens to cast upon them, he holds her closer and presses a lingering kiss to her temple, a show of comfort and support she acknowledges with a kiss of her own.

It feels so natural, so familiar, the little kisses and touches they can finally share with each other. Even as they finally make their way downstairs for breakfast, he can’t help but reach out to lace their fingers together, and Rey doesn’t react with anything but a smile as they walk into the informal dining room hand-in-hand.

The same can’t be said of their friends, but Ben figures they’ve earned the right to overreact a bit after all of the discretion they’ve shown over the past few days. Jannah breaks into the biggest smile he’s ever seen, while Rose happily claps her hands together and Poe lets his jaw drop in an exaggerated show of surprise. Finn is perhaps the only one of them who takes this development in stride, shaking his head with a knowing smile before he breaks the silence.

“About damn time, you two.”

“Finn!” Rey hisses in betrayal, but soon enough she’s laughing along with everyone else and so is Ben. It’s unexpectedly wonderful, being able to share this with people he’s now happy to call his friends. This morning feels like the beginning of the rest of their lives, the first of many days to be spent in the company of people he trusts and cares for.

And all that stands between them and that new life is Palpatine.

He and Rey trade nervous looks throughout breakfast, and at some point she reaches under the table to tuck her free hand into his for comfort. It’s no small task, what they’re about to ask of their friends, but Ben knows they can be trusted with this, knows that they will do anything to protect Rey.

As the last scraps of pancakes and eggs and fruit disappear, he signals Rey with a nod and decides to just go for it. “Guys, there’s something we–”

Ben never gets a chance to finish that sentence, abruptly cut off by the sound of all their phones simultaneously going mad with notifications.

Rose is the first one to reach for her phone, and her gasp cuts through the shrill tones of everyone else’s notifications.

“Holy fuck,” Poe mutters under his breath next, just as Ben finally retrieves his own phone from his back pocket to see what exactly is going on. The small device is absolutely blowing up, multiple missed calls and messages and even emails, but it’s a push notification from his news app that has his blood running cold.

CONFIRMED, NINETEEN YEARS LATER: Sheev Palpatine found responsible for horrific death of son and daughter-in-law.

His first thought is Rey, who’s already looking at him with tears in her eyes.

“Sweetheart–” he croaks, reaching out for her only to have her flinch from his touch, shaking her head as tears spill down her cheeks.

“I’m sorry, Ben, I’m so sorry–”

He was already lost to begin with, completely taken aback by this sudden development, but now there’s no hiding the confusion in his voice. “What? Rey, why are you–”

She’s shaking now, lips quivering and shoulders trembling. “All those years of your family being apart, all those years of you growing up without your mother– it was all him, it was always him–”

This time, she lets him take her hand. “Rey, what are you talking about?” Ben asks, careful to be as gentle as he can.

A pointed cough finally reminds him that they’re not alone, and he looks back at their friends to find Jannah sliding her phone across the table to him. And there, in big, bold letters, is an unmissable headline.

SEPARATIST SHEEV: Duke of Onoam revealed to be shadowy mastermind behind violent uprising against royal family.

His pseudo-cousin is speaking, that much he can tell, but her words are lost to the ringing of his ears. Ben stares at those words until his vision goes blurry, until his lungs scream for him to breath, until Rey squeezes his hand.

“Ben, if that’s not… if you didn’t know, then what were you talking about?”

It feels like all the air has been sucked out of the room, like every single person at the table is holding their breath and waiting for a disaster to unfold.

There’s no easy way of doing this, but Rey deserves privacy, deserves space, deserves so much better than the lot she’s been given in life.

He gets up with a painfully loud scrape of his chair, and helps her out of her seat and into his arms.

“Let’s go for a walk.”

Rey follows him without question, without hesitation, deep into the woods of Varykino, far from prying eyes. And when he finally tells her the horrible truth, there is no one but him and the ancient trees and the open sky to witness her pain.

She cries.

She screams.

She mourns.

Ben holds her through it all, through sobs that rob her lungs of air and anger that has her swearing vengeance and grief that leaves her speechless. Minutes pass, possibly hours, and eventually she drifts off in his arms, utterly wrung out from this latest – and last, Ben swears to her – betrayal by the only family she has left in the world.

He carries her back to the house when it starts to drizzle, and Rey sleeps through it all, through the long walk back and the inquisitive eyes of their friends and the climb upstairs to her room. It’s only once he’s tucked her into her bed that he turns to acknowledge Rose’s presence, hovering by the door.

“Can you… can you just sit with her while I talk to my mom?” he whispers, pressing a lingering kiss to Rey’s wrist before letting go of her. “I don’t want her to wake up alone.”

Rose’s smile is a small, sad thing, one that looks entirely out of place on his bubbly friend and only serves to drive home just how wrong everything about this day has been. “Of course, Ben.”

The door closes behind him with a muted click, and even though he knows Rey is in good hands with Rose, every fiber of his being longs to turn around and head straight back to her side. Ben fights against his instincts once again, promising himself it will be the last time he has to do so, and seeks out the privacy of his room to call his mother.

Leia picks up on the third ring. “I was wondering when you’d call.”

She sounds… composed, on the surface, but he knows her well enough now to detect the slightest hint of concern. Concern for what? It’s not like anyone could’ve gotten to them, all the way out here in Varykino, with royal security patrolling the perimeter as per her instructions–

Ben pinches the bridge of his nose. He really should’ve figured this out earlier. “So it was all planned, then? Sending us away to Varykino the exact week you finally decide to go after him?”

His mother sighs. “I’m sorry, honey, I wanted to tell you but… you know how it is with Palpatine – he’s a snake, that one. I couldn’t be sure that everything would actually come together for us to finally get him, so I figured it was probably best not to say anything. Oh, and on that note: you can all come home now if you’d like.”

He runs a hand through his hair, nervous giveaways be damned. If he looks like a mess, well, that’s because he is. “How did you even pull this off, anyway?”

“Well,” his mother drawls as Ben sits down heavily on his bed, settling in for what is sure to be a long and complicated story. It ends up spanning decades and continents, filled with dead ends and missing evidence and trails gone cold until just weeks ago, when the attorney general had been contacted by two individuals of note.

Brendol Hux and Enric Pryde, known separatists who had escaped the initial crackdown following the bombing and been in hiding ever since, had reached out to Amilyn Holdo’s office in the hopes of striking a plea bargain.

Pryde, as it turns out, is dying from lung cancer, and with only months left to live has decided that he would like to see his home one last time and be laid to rest close to his parents. Hux, meanwhile, has been invited to his estranged son’s wedding, and would like to show up for the ceremony even if he has to do so in chains.

And so, in exchange for coming home, they’d provided Holdo with all the evidence she would need to go after Palpatine and keep him behind bars for the rest of his miserable life.

Ben heaves a sigh of relief. “So he’s gone for good, right?”

The pause on his mother’s end does not bode well. “Mom?”

“Well, we’ll still have to go through the trial first, of course, but Amilyn says they should–”

Should is not will. And after everything Rey has been through, the very least she deserves is the peace of mind that can only come from knowing that this monster is gone for good. “Mom. Please, tell me he won’t ever get anywhere near her again–”

“Ben,” his mother says firmly, cutting him off before he can get worked up. “I don’t know what the future holds, but no matter how this plays out, I promise to keep her safe, all right? I promise.”

The queen does not make promises lightly; throughout his entire life, Ben can count on one hand the number of promises she has made to him. And she’s never, ever given him reason to doubt her word, not even during all those years apart.

And just for once, Ben would like to be the kid who can trust that his mother will take care of everything.

“All right,” he acquiesces on an exhale, letting the tension seep out of his shoulders. His primary concern placated, Ben spends the last few minutes of the call assuring his mother that everyone is fine, discussing their return to Theed, and asking her to pass a message to his father.

“Tell him… tell him I’m working on it, and now it’s his turn.”

Leia lets out a small laugh despite her obvious confusion, amused as always by the little antics between her son and husband. She promises to send his message along, and ends the call with a see you soon instead of a goodbye.

It puts a smile on Ben’s face, but he doesn’t have the time to linger over that right now. He’s up and out of his room as soon as the call ends, heading straight back to Rey.

She wakes up just as Rose opens the door to let him in, and after a quick chat Rose disappears downstairs to update everyone else and prepare for their return to Theed.

Rey has pulled herself into a sitting position in her bed, cast adrift in a sea of twisted sheets and scattered pillows from this morning.

It feels like a lifetime ago, the memory of waking up with her in his arms and feeling like all was right with the world.

“Will you…” Rey murmurs, looking so small as she pulls her knees up to her chest. “Will you hold me, just for a bit? I don’t want to feel alone right now.”

He closes the distance between them immediately, opening his arms for Rey to curl into. “You’re not alone,” Ben whispers as she wraps her arms tightly around his waist, pressing a kiss to the top of her head before she ducks under his chin. “I promise, Rey, you’re not alone.”

And just like his mother, he keeps his promises.

Their friends leave the very next day, while Ben and Rey decide to stay in Varykino for another week to let things in the city die down a bit.

Rey only allows herself a day to mourn, jumping out of bed the next morning with a fierce declaration that she won’t let her grandfather control her life any longer. They fill their days with life and laughter and love instead, taking this time to just… be with each other now that they finally can.

They go swimming in the lake, and Rey only laughs a little bit when she discovers that Ben has never learned to swim despite growing up within walking distance from Chandrila’s famous beaches. She spends the rest of that afternoon teaching him how to swim, and he wishes the sun would never set.

They linger under the night sky, coming up with their own constellations, and this time Rey lets him kiss her under the watchful gaze of the stars until they’re both breathless and flushed and smiling so hard it hurts.

They hide under the covers together, pretending that they’re the only two people alive, that there is only him and her and the way their bodies fit perfectly together, as if they were made for each other. “Maybe we were,” Rey whispers shakily when he accidentally gives voice to that particular thought, and Ben knows he’s never been this happy in his entire life.

On their last night, Rey rests her head on his shoulder and tells him she intends to concede. “I was already thinking about it, of course, even before everything. But now… now there’s no way the people of Naboo will ever want anything to do with a Palpatine ever again, let alone put one on the throne. And I don’t blame them one bit,” she mutters, and it’s the first time he’s ever heard her sound anything close to bitter.

Ben turns on his side to look her in the eye, curls one hand around her waist to hold her close. “You are nothing like him, Rey. Nothing.”

Rey drops her eyes to his chest, where her hand rests over his heart, and shakes her head. “I have his blood. I have his name–”

“So take a different one.”

That gets her attention, at least. “What?” she asks sharply, eyes wide with confusion. She looks so genuinely taken aback that it dawns on Ben, for the very first time, that maybe changing your last name isn’t a thing in Naboo.

“Do you guys not do that here? It happens all the time in the republic,” he informs a stunned Rey. “Hell, Solo isn’t even my dad’s actual name. He just picked a new one when his family failed him.”

He can tell she’s actually considering it when she relaxes under his touch and absent-mindedly tugs on her lower lip. “What would I choose, though?”

And just like that, Ben knows what he has to do.

This is not at all part of the plan, the complete opposite of a plan in fact, the farthest thing from his mind when he’d first suggested that she change her name. It’s rushed, and insane, and premature, but–

Like everything about their relationship so far, it just feels right. And hey, it had taken his parents just one summer to fall in love for a lifetime. So why not him? Why not them?

Rey catches on mere seconds before he finds the courage to go through with it, shooting him an alarmed look when his heart starts racing under her hand. “Ben, is everything–”

“How do you feel about Solo-Organa-Skywalker-Amidala?” Ben asks, his voice miraculously steady and even calm, somehow.

She gasps, her lips parted in a little O that he desperately wants to kiss. But he can’t right now, not when he’s just asked her to marry him while they’re both lounging in bed and have only really properly been together for a week and this is madness, yes, but still he can’t find it in himself to backtrack, to imagine any other path for them now that this one has embedded itself in his mind.

So Ben keeps going. “It’s a bit of a mouthful, but you know how it is with royal names–”

Rey lets out a strangled little laugh at that, and yeah, sure, he can see the absurdity of thinking that’s why she’s hesitating to respond to his proposal.

Finally, she raises her hand to cup his cheek, her lips trembling as she tries to find the right words. He should be nervous, he should be terrified, but one look into Rey’s eyes and Ben knows they’re going to be all right, no matter what.

She looks at him with stars in her eyes even now, even as she fights to keep a smile off her face and be the rational one here. “Ben, you can’t possibly mean…”

He shrugs, and it’s not even an act of bravado. “Why not?”

Because really, if she wants to and he wants to, then why on earth not?

“We’ve only known each other for three months!” Rey points out with a laugh, though she sounds just as unconvinced by that argument as he is.

“When you know, you know,” Ben counters, feeling a wave of calm wash over him at the reminder. He knows. Maybe he’s always known.

Rey puts on a serious face for her next point. “My grandfather tried to kill your family.”

“That’s his issue, not yours,” he reminds her sternly, staring her down until she finally gives in.

“Okay, fine. But we… we’re not…” She’s grasping at straws now, and they both know it. “I mean, you haven’t even said that you…”

She looks up at him from under her lashes, and he’s reminded of that day in the gallery all over again, reminded of how hopeless he’d been even at the peak of their supposed rivalry. Ben thinks of how she never hated him, not even when she had good reason to, thinks of how that day after the disaster with TheedFeed she’d chosen to comfort him rather than gloat, thinks of how empty the palace and his life and his heart had been after she left.

“That you…”

He rests his hand over hers, still curved around his cheek, and tugs her closer to his lips, brushing a kiss to her inner wrist. “Love you?” Ben murmurs gently, smiling as Rey’s breath hitches. “I do.”

Her eyes have never been brighter, even as they cloud over with tears. “I love you too, Ben.”

It’s a relief to actually hear the words, even if he’s had good reason to suspect for quite a while now. Rey must feel the same way too, because suddenly laughter bubbles past her lips, a sound of pure joy, and he can’t resist ducking down for a taste of happiness.

“Oh my god,” Rey whispers against his lips, still laughing between kisses. “Are we… are we actually doing this?”

Ben presses one last, lingering kiss to her lips before he pulls away. They might’ve done everything else out of order but this bit, at least, he’s determined to get right.

She laughs again when he gets out of bed and drops down on one knee, beaming at him even as tears spill down her cheeks.

“Rey,” he begins, reaching for her hand. He’s never been good at grand speeches, not even with all the help in the world, but speaking from the heart… now that he can do. “You once told me this country has a history of loving its queens,” Ben reminds her, and they both smile at that hazy memory from a lifetime ago. “No matter what happens from here on out, I know our people will fall in love with you just as I have, if they haven’t already.”

“Ben,” she chokes out, her voice thick with happy tears, the only kind of tears he will ever cause her.

He reaches up to brush them away nonetheless, smiling when Rey catches his free hand and leans into his touch. “And I know… I know this is far from the proper royal way,” Ben pauses, committing to memory the sound of their intertwined laughter before he goes on, “but then again, I’ve never been a proper royal. Will you marry me anyway, Rey?”

It takes a moment for him to actually hear her answer, taken aback as he is by Rey suddenly throwing herself into his arms and knocking the both of them to the ground. But in between laughter and sobs and kisses, there is only one word chanted over and over again, the most beautiful sound he has ever heard.

“Yes, yes, yes.”

.

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Queen Leia ends up staying on the throne for another two years after the downfall of Duke Palpatine, guiding her nation through a time of great instability. And just as she had done in the earliest years of her reign, she helps her people heal with joy and love, guiding Naboo out of the darkness with a period of celebration that begins with a vow renewal between the queen and her consort, and ends with the union of her son and his betrothed.

The royal wedding is celebrated from coast to coast, throngs of well-wishers lining the streets wherever they go for the next month, Nabooians everywhere hoping to catch a glimpse of the besotted couple whose story has already been turned into no less than three tacky movies over in the republic.

And when Leia finally steps down on the first anniversary of the wedding, Naboo welcomes its new king and queen with open arms, both monarchs equally beloved by all.