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‘What do you mean you didn’t fight him for it?’
The woman who stood in front of him felt unrecognisable in that moment. Axe Woves couldn’t believe that Bo-Katan Kryze would let anyone else have the Darksaber. And not just have it, but she had been right there in a room with him and she hadn’t challenged him.
As long as he had known her getting the Darksaber back from Gideon had been her sole focus. Every move that she had made was a step towards reclaiming Mandalore and reuniting their people.
The guilt of having surrendered the Darksaber to Gideon in an attempt to save Mandalore had driven her every day towards her goal of fixing it. It was something she had opened up to him about many times, a secret anguish she held close to her chest, afraid to show her fear of failure to the people she led so strongly.
So hearing her admit she had let the cult zealot take the Darksaber without so much as an argument was a curveball he hadn’t expected.
‘I refuse to accept it as a gift again,’ Bo whispered quietly. ‘Mandalore has suffered enough for that mistake.’
He could tell that was the truth, but he couldn’t ignore the nagging feeling that there were other options she had chosen to ignore. Perhaps ones she was ignoring for good reason.
‘Then you should have challenged him,’ Axe argued. ‘From what I saw of the guy you could take him. Easilyy.’
‘He had just said goodbye to the kid he loves. I was hardly going to beat the crap out of him.’
‘Okay then we wait a few weeks, track him down and challenge him,’ Axe suggested. ‘I’ll come with you.’
Her silence said it all.
Axe wasn’t sure why it hurt him so much, the idea that she was refusing to battle it out for the Darksaber.
He had loved her for a long time, a feeling that he knew very well that she didn’t return, despite their on and off relationship over the years.
All this time he had assumed that she wasn’t interested in feelings, her focus instead on ruling Mandalore.
But there was a tone to the way she was talking about Din Djarin that irked him.
Like she cared about the guy. About this super religious weirdo who never took his helmet off, who’s people had never even lived on Mandalore, instead escaping the destruction by hiding on Concordia before scattering across the galaxy instead of staying to fight for their planet.
They weren’t his kind of Mandalorians.
And he hadn’t thought they were hers either.
‘I’m not going to do that,’ Bo finally spoke. ‘Maybe this is a sign that I had my chance with the Darksaber. If Din Djarin wants to be the next Mand’alor then it’s all his.’
She turned to leave and without a second thought Axe reached out, grabbing her arm to stop her.
He wasn’t sure what he was intending to ask her at that point, but he knew he wasn’t ready for this conversation to end. He needed to know why she was suddenly so reluctant to fight for the thing she had always wanted, why Din Djarin was the thing that had broken her.
But as her eyes swung around to glare at him, he knew he wasn’t going to get the answers he wanted out of her that day.
Yanking her arm away from him, she took a step back, folding her arms across her chest protectively.
‘I thought you were our leader,’ Axe said snidely.
‘And I thought you were my friend,’ she shot back. ‘Someone I could be honest with.’
‘Friend. Is that all I am?’
‘Axe.’
He knew if he pressed that topic he was going to get answers he didn’t want to hear.
‘If you can’t lead our people then you need to step down, let someone else do it.’
‘Is that really how you feel?’ she questioned, her voice soft.
For the first time all conversation he could see the hurt in her eyes and he hated that he was the one causing that for her.
She seemed to sense his reluctance to respond.
‘Okay. Fine. If that’s what you believe, Axe Woves, the fleet is yours.’
Without another word she turned and walked out of the room. He hesitated for a moment, considering following her, but he decided it would be best to let her calm down so he let it go. They could talk tomorrow once they had both had time to think things over.
**
He was shocked to find out she was gone the next morning. Koska Reeves had held a holorecording out for the group and he watched as Bo-Katan announced him as the new leader. Under any other circumstances he may have been delighted to be promoted, but instead all he felt was the swirling rage of betrayal.
The anger simmered inside him all day. How dare she leave without saying goodbye? Without even giving him a chance to continue their conversation.
It was like he didn’t even know who Bo-Katan was anymore.
He was sitting outside the fleet, staring out at the dark of night, drinking some kind of strong liquor he’d been keeping for a special occasion, when Koska approached him.
‘What did you do?’ she asked.
‘Me?’
He felt defensive as Koska took a seat next to him on one of the weapon cases, her eyes focused on him in the fading light of the nearby fire.
‘Yeah, you.’
‘I simply asked why she chose not to fight the zealot for the Darksaber,’ the words came out harsh.
He couldn’t even pretend to hide his anger.
‘Axe Woves, are you jealous?’ Koska smiled at him.
It annoyed him.
Because she wasn’t wrong.
But he didn’t want everyone to be able to see it.
‘I don’t understand why she’s being so nice to the guy,’ he complained, but he could hear the bite in his voice had faded a little.
‘Because he had just given up his adopted son to some Jedi for training, the poor guy was crying, had his heartbroken,’ Koska shared.
‘He had his helmet off?’
This was news to Axe.
And it made things so much worse.
That meant Bo-Katan had seen the zealot’s face, and obviously she had liked what she saw enough to give up her life goals and abandon her people.
‘I knew it, you are jealous.’
‘I don’t think anyone who makes Bo-Katan forget who she is, is worth being jealous of,’ Axe argued.
But angry again, he stood up and headed back inside his ship, keen to get away from this conversation with Koska and anyone else who might dare to question his feelings.
Especially since she was dead right.
**
She was predictable at least. It was easy enough to find her, moping around in her castle on Kalevala, even though her droid kept insisting he leave.
He felt his heart clench as he saw her sitting idly in the throne. She looked heartbroken and miserable, and he hadn’t seen her look like that in a very long time.
Maybe not ever this bad.
‘Bo-Katan.’
It was a greeting, nothing else. He was doing his best to keep his voice even, afraid of sparking another fight.
Her eyes raised to meet his, annoyed at the interruption.
‘What do you want, Axe?’
‘I came to check you were okay, and I can see you’re clearly not.’
He was being genuine, no one had heard from her in a long time and he knew her well enough to know that wasn’t a good sign. Bo-Katan might be short tempered and have a tendency to make rash decisions, but months of silence, without even a rumour of her causing trouble elsewhere in the galaxy, was worrying.
She didn’t see it that way.
‘A likely story,’ she replied. ‘You just wanted to see if I had the Darksaber yet.’
Getting up off the throne she walked towards Axe, her eyes dead and her demeanour defeated.
‘No, Bo, I care about you…’ he said quietly.
‘Only my sister was allowed to call me Bo,’ she snapped at him.
He ignored her tone, determined to not get sucked into a fight. She knew how to enrage him, she had done it on many occasions by accident, and she was pushing all the right buttons. Ignoring him, refusing to believe his words, twisting what he was saying.
‘I came here to offer to fight him with you,’ Axe admitted. ‘I was correctly worried that you were wasting your life away dwelling on your mistakes, and I thought I could help you right one of them.’
‘I’m not going to fight Din Djarin,’ she said simply.
Din Djarin.
She used to call him all sorts of name, but not anymore. Now she just called him by his real name.
‘Have you seen him?’
‘Once,’ she admitted. ‘On Lothal. I ran into him in a bar. He’s about as happy without the little guy as I am without my planet. We had a great night being miserable together.’
The idea of the two of them spending a night together in a dodgy bar on Lothal stung. Up until now his jealousy had felt a little irrational, but suddenly the idea there could be something between her and the zealot felt more plausible.
It must have shown on his face.
‘You know the upside of wearing a helmet all the time is nobody can see your feelings written clearly all over your face.’
Suddenly conscious that she had seen the flash of jealousy, he did his best to make his expression neutral.
‘The downside is you can never really get to know anyone,’ Axe shot back.
‘You’re not wrong.’
He didn’t know what that meant and he wasn’t sure he wanted to. The gnawing feeling was eating away at his stomach as he spoke to her and he was beginning to think coming there was a bad idea.
‘Go back to your fleet, Axe,’ she said sternly. ‘I don’t need anyone’s help, and if I did I wouldn’t call you.’
That one really hurt.
And it was the final blow.
Without another word he turned around and left her standing alone in her empty palace.
A princess with nothing to rule.
**
The next time he saw her he wasn’t surprised that the person by her side was her favourite Mandalorian – Din Djarin. And he couldn’t help but noticed the Darksaber was still in his possession.
The green-eyed monster took over watching them walk through the field.
And fighting her was kind of cathartic.
Even if he lost.
But as Din Djarin looked at the group and asked the question, Axe felt his heart soften a bit.
‘Would this blade then not belong to her?’
He wasn’t wrong. It was a loophole but it was a clever one, and as Axe looked to Bo and her eyes searched the group, he realised she was having the same realisation.
‘Would it not belong to her?’ the zealot repeated.
He looked from Din Djarin to Bo-Katan and he could see it. Hearing the words from the man that she trusted, Bo-Katan was ready to take the blade again, to lead her people in the way Axe had always known she was destined to.
He hadn’t seen that fire in her for a long time.
And perhaps he had been wrong to judge Din Djarin’s influence on her. Perhaps it had all been part of a journey she was required to go on before she could accept she was the best person to unite Mandalore.
It was clear he wasn’t the person who could have lead her to this moment.
And therefore he had to concede.
‘It would,’ Axe spoke.
He felt all eyes on him. Din’s. Bo-Katan’s. His soldiers.
And as he watched her accept the Darksaber from Din Djarin he knew that this man, no matter his shortcomings, had done for Bo-Katan what he never could.
Made her believe in herself.