Chapter Text
They were stuck in Krownest. Hardly the worst thing to happen, but Bo had forgotten how cold it was. It was the kind of cold that chilled you to the bones. The kind that really you shouldn’t have been able to forget. She had no idea how she had. But luckily now, Axe had no trouble constantly reminding her.
“It’s so kriffing cold here,” Axe said as he sat in front of the fireplace at Wren Stronghold. His wife and Koska were next to him. Both of them rolled their eyes, even though everyone was used to Axe being Axe all the time, especially his wife. She had the patience of a saint. Bo certainly never had, even if she loved Axe like a brother.
“Yes, we know,” Koska said as she glared at him.
“It’s really not that bad,” Ursa said. And actually from what Bo could remember from the time she lived here as a child during one of the civil wars, it wasn’t, but Axe was from Mandalore and used to Mandalore’s hotter weather.
“Yeah, it’s fine,” Bo said. She grabbed her helmet and stood up. “I’m heading out.”
Ursa raised an eyebrow. “Where are you going?”
“To visit the family that I stayed with during the civil war when I was a child.” Bo was already heading toward the door. She should have done this earlier and now was a good time.
“There’s supposed to be a blizzard later,” Ursa said, almost scolding her.
“I’ll be back before then,” Bo said, even though she could always just stay with the family that she had during the war if she had to. That might even be nice. They were like parents to her. She would always love them.
Ursa sighed but nodded. Maybe she would have said more, but Bo walked out before she could. She really needed to get some time out of the Wren Stronghold. And away from most of the people there.
She had just gotten outside and was heading toward the speeders when she heard the crunch of snow behind her. She spun around, thinking it would be Ursa trying to convince her to stay. It was getting old.
But it wasn’t Ursa and was Din. One of the few people who wasn’t annoying her too much, despite their complicated relationship. She was pretty sure the Order had said all sorts of things against her, and yet now they were still allies. Bo was glad they were. Din was carrying what looked like coats.
“Did Ursa send you?” Bo asked.
He shook his head. “No, I needed to get out of there too. Axe really—”
“Yes, he really likes to tell us that it’s cold as if we can’t tell ourselves.”
Din nodded. He was wearing all his armor like he usually did. Yes, she knew he had been in a cult, but she didn’t get it. He had taken off his helmet before in front of them. She couldn’t help but want to see his face again. Why? It was strange when someone you talked to regularly was always wearing a helmet. But that wasn’t the only reason. Din was… well… he was cute, not that Bo should think about that. But he was. Much cuter than Axe and Koska and she saw their faces all the time. She’d like to see Din’s face more.
Sometimes she hated that she thought his face was cute. It wasn't well... it wasn't the way.
“Are you okay with me coming?” Din asked, probably because she had been silent for so long. Not that he ever talked much.
“Yeah, as long as you don’t start acting like Axe. I need a break from that,” Bo said and then she turned and went toward the speeders. They ended up taking one that just had room for the two of them which was fine. She probably would have taken a smaller one if it had been just her.
Still this one was small, and their shoulders were touching. Not just their shoulders but their legs were also pushed against each other. Bo… Bo was never this close with Din and the two of them weren’t ever really alone either. Yes, maybe for a short time but that was all. They hadn’t ever been like this. It felt better than it should have and Din smelled good. For a moment, her cheeks heated up at the thought.
But it wasn’t a big deal. No. No it wasn’t. She wasn’t going to act like a teenager. Nope. Not Bo. She was way too old for that.
And she was a warrior. She had been fighting for Mandalore for decades now, and she would fight for decades more if she had to.
She needed to just concentrate on driving the speeder. She hadn’t gone to see them in awhile and so it was important to concentrate especially when Krownest was a winter wonderland. And especially since her hormones decided to act all weird around Din. It had to be because she had been stuck in the Wren Stronghold for so long. Being stuck in one place must be messing with her mind.
But now she was out of there so soon she would go back to being normal. Normal Bo who didn’t get owls in her stomach when she was around Din, who barely even took his helmet off in front of her.
She quickly put her own one on when she was sure she would be safe to do so when driving. After about an hour they arrived. Bo jumped out as if she was on fire, but Din tried to get out at the same time and the two of collided and both fell.
And he landed on top of her because of course he did. And of course, the owls were back in her stomach because he was on top of her. She thought he would get off right away, but he didn’t and he was still there. Stars, she was glad she had her helmet on.
“Um… Din… You should probably get off me,” Bo said after about a minute of the two of them just laying there. She wished she could see his face expression, but at least he couldn’t see hers either. She was sure her face was red.
He immediately did as soon as she said that. “Yes, I’m sorry. Sorry, Bo.” He offered her his hand. She took it and let him pull her up. And then of course, she somehow slipped on ice and fell into his arms. Stars, what was going on? She pulled away and laughed nervously.
“So this is the place!” Bo said, gesturing to it, even though obviously Din could see it.
“So you stayed here during one of the civil wars?” Din looked at it. Her foster parents' place was small and only had two bedrooms, but it was cozy, and Bo had loved it when she stayed there. She had good memories playing with her foster sister there. Her foster parents had been wonderful. Even when she had gone back to her mother and sister, they had still been there for her as much as she can. She was grateful to them.
“Yes, the one when I was a little kid,” Bo said, trying to explain it to him. She put her hands behind her back. “My mother sent me away because she was worried someone might try to hurt me because my sister was the Duchess.” Satine had been dead for two decades and Bo was still tied to her.
“It’s not a pa—”
“I didn't always live in the palace, even when Satine was duchess.” She glanced at him. “Besides, it would be pretty obvious someone…” Bo tried to find the words. “Someone related to someone important was there if the house was a mansion.”
“Yeah, that makes sense,” Din said.
“I’m not some princess who only lives in mansions anyway, despite what Boba Fett might think.” She really needed to shut up. “Oh, and don’t fall on me again. They’ll think we’re dating.” Yep, she needed to shut up. "It's for the best if they don't think something that insane."
Din just nodded.
The only person she had dated who she had introduced to Orie and Tia, her foster parents during the war, had been Fenn, who they had loved. Fenn… Poor Fenn… Bo sighed and shook her head. She’d never get over his death. She still had nightmares about it. It wasn’t supposed to happen. He should be here.
“Bo-Katan, are you o—”
“I’m fine.” Bo didn’t wait for him to say anything else and walked over to the house with Din behind her. The snow crunched under their feed as they went. Bo knocked on the door, expecting for one of them to answer. No one did.
Din looked at her.
And then Bo remembered. “Dank Farrik.”
“What?” Din asked. .
“They told me before they were going somewhere during the winter. They’re probably there. I don’t know when they’re coming back.” Bo sighed and shook her head. She couldn’t believe that she had forgotten. It made her sad. She wanted to see them. They were the closest things she had to parents left. Really, along with Ursa, they were the closest she had to family. “I forgot until just now.”
“Does that mean we have to go back to the Wren Stronghold?” Din asked with a sigh. He probably didn’t want to go back to hearing Axe bitch about the cold either.
“No, we don’t have to go back, not yet. I don’t think I could handle it.” Bo smiled, even though he wouldn’t be able to see it because she still had her helmet on. “I know where a key is. If they still keep it there.”
To get to it, Bo had to dig up a rock that was covered in snow near the house. She lifted it and sure enough the keys were under them. She waved them in front of Din. “They never change the hiding spot. Luckily for us.”
Bo let the two of them in. It was amazing how little the house had changed over the years. Just stepping foot in it reminded her of when she had been a little girl during the war. That had been a hard time in her life, but it had been happy in a way too because of her foster parents. They had been so kind and understanding with her.
“I can give you a tour,” Bo said. It felt weird to wear her helmet in the house, so she took it off even though she was worried something weird would happen again since something seemed to want awkward moments to happen. “It might have changed a bit since the last time I came here.”
But she doubted much had changed.
“Sure,” Din said, looking at the karyai, the living room, which had a nice warm fireplace that Bo used to love to sit near as a kid. She had been told wonderful stories in front of it. Stories about Mandalorian warriors. Stars, she had loved them. There were some sofas that hadn’t been there when she was younger and a breakfast table not too different than the one when she was little. The grey sofas looked so comfortable.
Bo put her helmet on the breakfast table before giving him a tour. Pretty much everything was the same as before, except the room that Bo used to stay in had been changed into an office. It made sense; they didn’t need to have the twin beds they used to. She showed Din the rest of the house as well but didn’t enter her foster parents’ room.
“So there you have it.” Bo put her hands behind her back. “The house I stayed at. I can show you some of the places that I used to play at. I mean none of them are super exciting. I wasn’t allowed to go too close to town for the most part.”
He looked at her and she imagined he looked curious.
“If I went to town someone on the other side of the war might have seen and killed me.” Bo shrugged as if it wasn’t a big deal. It had happened so long ago so now it wasn’t. But she had been afraid as a child. Oddly enough mostly of Jedi who she thought might be torturing her sister.
Really she didn’t know where she got that idea from? Given Korkie existed any “torture” that her sister got was the kind she wanted since it wasn’t torture at all.
“Stars! But you were a kid!”
“You know how war is. It doesn’t care how old someone is,” Bo said.
He nodded. “When I was a kid, I was almost killed by battle droids and they…” He swallowed and looked down. “They killed my parents.”
“I’m sorry,” Bo said. “I really am.”
He nodded. “I’m sorry about yours.” He looked at her. “It was Death Watch that saved me.”
She had figured that and nodded. It was odd to her even now. Even though she had been in Death Watch and had been… whatever she had been… with Pre, so many things they did seemed contradictory to Bo.
“I’m glad they saved you,” Bo said. For a moment, she wanted to touch his face, or rather his helmet. Oh, why not! She leaned closer and did it. Just for a moment and then let her hand fall. It would have been better to touch his face. She wondered if he had recently shaved or not.
“Even if I did take the Darksaber when I wasn’t supposed to?”
Bo rolled her eyes. “Even if, though that is annoying. You barely know anything about Mandalore.”
“I’m learning.”
“Maybe,” Bo smirked.
“You can have the Darksaber, Bo,” Din said and then he grabbed it and offered it to her. “We can tell everyone we had a great battle and I yielded. No one needs to know the truth.”
“No, I… I can’t.” She couldn’t just take the Darksaber again. Not like she had with Sabine. Not again. Not after what happened. You might have been pressured to take it, but it had been a horrible mistake. She knew that now.
The Purge. Fenn dead. So many people dead. Maybe things would have been different if… She would never just take the Darksaber again. She wouldn’t break the rules no matter what Ursa and the other clans wanted. No matter what Din wanted.
“Are you sure?” Din asked which caused her to nod right away.
But she had things to say too.
“I should have had it on me during the…” Bo bit her lip. “There were times when I hated it. I couldn’t stand to even see the thing.” Right now, she couldn’t look away from the weapon. The weapon she had been obsessed with as a child. And then…
“You hated the Darksaber but you want it now?”
“I want it because of what it means and because… Not because of the weapon itself. I just couldn’t stand to have the Darksaber on me all the time.”
There was a long silence. “Why?”
She reached out and took it from Din. Holding it felt the same as it had after Sabine had given it to her. And so different from the few times Pre Vizsla let her hold it, and she thought it was an amazing weapon. Now it felt heavier and like a burden. “This weapon… It was used to kill my sister.” Her voice broke, which she hated. She put the Darksaber back in Din’s hand.
“What? Your sister was murdered by the Darksaber?”
Bo nodded, wishing she had her helmet on. “My sister was innocent. She wasn’t like…” She sighed. “Like me.” Even at eighteen when that happened, Bo hadn’t been innocent. She deserved to be the one who was killed more than Satine.
“How could you stand to have the Darksaber? Didn’t it remind you of her?” Din asked before he put the Darksaber away. His voice was soft though, not judgmental.
“It does, but I had to have it. I did it for Mandalore. I would do anything for Mandalore.” When she joined Death Watch as a teenager, she thought that was for Mandalore too and then… Now she wished she had stayed with Satine and Korkie. “And I have…. Satine would understand. She’d do anything for Mandalore too.”
Din nodded. “I’m sorry.”
Bo didn’t say anything at first. “It killed Pre Vizsla too.”
“That’s not much of a loss.”
“Probably not,” Bo admitted. She might have looked up to Pre and even viewed him as like a father to her when she had been a teenager, but then he had done what he had. Things that couldn’t be forgiven.
But when he died that meant Maul took Mandalore and right away Bo had known that would be a disaster for everyone.
“So let me show you the places I used to play at when I was a little girl,” Bo said, trying to change to subject. This was getting too dark. She didn’t know why she felt like she could just tell Din this kind of thing. Surely he was freaked out.
He probably thought she was a mess. He sure had seemed to when he caught her drinking poison to boost her resistance to it when they both had been sick. Sometimes she could swear that he wanted to ask her about that and if she had gone back to drinking it. He just didn’t understand that she was drinking it because her enemies might want to poison her. It wasn’t like she was trying to hurt herself. She was trying to survive.
But he just didn’t understand. Not that many people did. Ursa thought it was insane too, even though she should get it.
For some reason she didn’t want him to view her as a mess.
“Sounds good,” Din said.
Bo forced herself to smile at him, despite the conversation they had just been having. Today could be good. Much better than staying at the Wren Stronghold. Sure, she didn’t know how exciting it would be just showing him around, but maybe something would happen that Bo didn’t expect.
Maybe things would get more exciting than she thought.