Chapter Text
Silence. Not a breath of wind. No rustle of the trees overhead. Simply, silence. Luke stood atop a mossy boulder and looked up at the brilliant flare of stars overhead. The trees towered skyward, their leaves reaching for the sun that would be up in a few hours. He hadn’t felt peace like this since Tatooine. And wasn’t that a contradiction?
Tatooine had been a place to leave. Yet, he missed the sand. He missed the heat. He missed— He took a deep breath and released his emotions into the Force. This was why he was out here, alone, in the silence. To find peace.
He smiled wryly up at the dark skies, as a rogue high wind rustled the leaves overhead. He, a son of the desert, was now a man of the forests. That was what living did, took one and tipped one into unexpected situations, one no scrawny desert child could have dreamed. He certainly couldn’t have ever imagined trees this large, not even with the holos Aunt B—
He took a long shuddering breath as the birds nested in the canopy chirruped the approach of dawn that he could not yet see. The stars were cold, bright, and distant.
He breathed in. He was Luke Skywalker. He breathed out. Jedi. He breathed in. And he would share his emotions with the Force. His breath hitched.
“Luke?”
He would never admit to jumping. Slipping off the mossy boulder. Catching himself with the Force, in mid-air. He only stumbled his landing lightly and turned with a bright smile to the woman who stood on the path. He could only make out the glint of her eyes in the dim shadows and grey light of the pre-dawn as she huddled in a robe too large for her.
“I felt,” she began softly, carefully, as if to comfort him, then tilted her head and hummed.
Uh, oh, Luke felt his cheeks heat as he scrambled to damp down on his personal shields. She was wearing his robe. His robe. His mind must be truly scrambled for him to not sense her, or be able to scrape up a way to be himself in front of her. Or the self he wanted her to see. The suave Jedi, not the fumbling farm boy.
“Luke,” she said softly, and reached out to cup his cheek.
He went still, then with a shuddering breath, leaned into her warm hand. He hadn’t realised how cold he had been, out in the chill of the night air, without his robe. She lightly brushed a thumb over his lips and he closed his eyes with a shudder, all the universe becoming just her touch. Then she was gone.
He blinked open his eyes as she neatly slipped out of his robe and threw it around his shoulders, tugging at it to settle it tidily.
“There,” she said, and promptly tucked herself under his arm and slipped her arm around his waist. Burrowed up against his side, warm, solid, and grounding.
“That’s better,” she said soberly.
He hugged her to his side and pressed a far too desperate, yet relieved, kiss to her hair. He loved its colour in the sun, the many shades of red and gold among the strands. Many a productive hour had been had whiled away, contemplating its striking nature, and more so the passionate woman who had settled into his life, and somehow stayed. No one stayed. Not for him. Yet. She had. He swallowed hard.
“Luke?” she tugged at him and they began to amble down the path.
“Where are we going?” he asked, desperate not to think.
“A little further,” she said and they walked, lightly jostling each other, yet comforted by the bumps and minor collisions that was navigating the path through the forest in the pre-dawn light.
She brought him down to the river, not the one on the far side of the school that they used for fishing, or the one that lead to the waterfalls. No, this one was their spot. An hours walk, and some force leaps, away from the school, far enough away that they had a semblance of privacy from inquisitive minds, bright in the force and naturally empathic. He would never live down the mortification of having to give the Talk to his two eldest students, after he and Mara Jade had—, well—. It had been awkward for him. Mara Jade had handled it like a champion, stating facts, and then had sat with them as they talked about their own feelings and who they fancied and why. The less he thought about the whole incident the better, though he had sat down and worked out what to say so he wouldn’t be caught flat footed again. He was determined to be a good teacher, and being flustered by his student’s knowing gazes and wide-eyed attempts at innocent queries was not going to scramble his wits again. Thank the Force for the woman at his side. She wove into the gaps in his life that he hadn’t known were there, and somehow filled them. No, that was not quite true. It was more of a dance, livelier and heartier for their being two of them on the same path.
They stood on the sandy shore of the river, listening as the various birds took up their calls as the dawn steadily broke overhead.
“Usually, you’re happy to be out here,” Mara Jade said, still burrowed under his cloak, and he realised she had neglected to bring her own.
He laughed, bright and joyful, as their Force shared memories of delight and pleasure skipped over the depthless lake of sorrows that he had been drowning in before she had arrived.
“Luke, what’s wrong?” she turned in his hug, and peered up at him.
“My—”
He took a deep breath to steady himself. To speak the words.
“My lightsaber—”
She rested her forehead against his chest and he hugged him, kept him from falling apart. No, she was a comfort, a companion. For all he loved her, she was not a substitute for his reliance on the Force. She was strength, but not his strength. She was love, but not to all consuming ends. And, oddly, she felt the same. Her love was freedom, joy, and shared sorrow and support.
The sun was throwing shafts of light through the treetops when they stepped apart and took in their surroundings once more. It was cool by the flowing water. The air brisk and refreshing, and exactly what Luke had wanted when he had first headed in this direction. Before he had stopped, standing on a rock, mired in the emotion and turmoil that exhaustion and being at the end of his tether had brought up. Then Mara Jade had arrived and somehow scooped up all his being and deposited him where he needed to be. Such a simple action, to walk alongside another, but powerful. For all his life was entwined with the Force and his mastery of it, she had a practicality about her that grounded him.
“I found another crystal,” he said, grimly not wanting to elaborate.
“I knew you would,” she stretched her arms above her head and flashed him a grin before crouching down and scooping up a handful of water to drink. She shook her hands, scattering droplets over the sand and his boots. She barked a laugh as he fussily used the corner of his cloak to dry them.
“What’s wrong?” she asked as the laughter rang in the too quiet silence, for all the river burbled and the birds chirruped.
He let out a long breath.
“I’m tired,” he said and smiled absently at nothing across the river, “and dark thoughts and dreams catch at me. It’s like walking the path before we cleared it, one gets scratched by thorns and twigs, I just need to meditate.”
“Luke,” she stood and hastily dried her hands on the bottom of her shirt then cupped his face in her small hands. Her eyes were sharp and intense as she peered at him.
“You faced another Force trial, didn’t you, to get that kyber crystal?”
He closed his eyes, Force trial was a very neutral term for the horrifying waking vision that he had pulled himself out of, and rested his forehead against hers as he breathed out.
“Then we need to meditate, Luke, not just you. I get the rock this time.”
“What? No, that’s my rock!”
They both scrambled up the bank of the river, pushing and shoving at each other and cheating with Force tugs and shoves to get to the best meditation spot. Mara Jade used his shoulders as a springboard and landed neatly on the rock. She settled so primly and radiated such contentment in the Force that Luke forgot to breathe in his wonder. She did that to him in unexpected moments. Reminded him exactly why he loved her so much. He laughed breathlessly and settled for the slightly smaller rock that wasn’t as flat as The Rock. Her smugness grew and hinted at several rewards for his concession later. His smile grew to a soppy grin.
“Focus,” she said primly and he laughed again, and it took quite a while before they stopped laughing and settled down to just breathe in the quiet of the morning once more.
When Luke opened his eyes once more, dappled light fell across the banks of the river, and sparkled on the surface as much as it flickered off the tiny silver fish beneath the surface. Mara Jade had retreated to the far side of the river and was now doing Force exercises, standing on a single hand and floating sticks, river rocks and in a very impressive show of control, an orb of water with silver fish in it. It tumbled to follow the fish as they swam. Luke didn’t know one could fall more in love with a person, but Mara Jade made it easy.
Leah had sent him a compilation of Senate footage years ago, mostly of their mother’s Senate addresses, but she had also included Anakin from before. It had been easy to see how much he had loved Padme, standing as her Jedi guard, but Leah had also included clips of the security footage from the building which had caught the pair sneaking off together. Those, he hadn’t been so sure of, there had been something desperate, almost cloying about Anakin’s advances. For all Padme accepted the clandestine meetings, and generally calmed Anakin by the end of them. That sort of reliance on another was a weakness. It was not weakness to need connection and love. Yet there was a suffocating nature to the way Anakin had sought it, instead of centering himself and accepting what love others could give him, he focussed on one and demanded more than they should give.
That was Aunt Beru’s lecture, right there, and she hadn’t even given it to Luke. She had dragged Old Ben out to the shade by their farm’s workshop and given him a short sharp lecture. He smiled sadly, it didn’t hurt quite so much to think of them now. He couldn’t quite remember what had upset Aunt Beru so much, but it had been the first time he had heard her angry, and it had stuck.
“I know you visit out of love, Ben,” she had scolded, “but love doesn’t suffocate. It breathes, and creates ways for others to feel the flow of air. You’re building dunes around him to protect him, but those very walls can smother him. Go think about why you need the walls in the first place, then you can come back.”
Ben had never returned, and Luke could guess why. As one of the last Jedi, it must have been painful that what he had once had in a community of thousands, he now had to share with just Luke and one or two very very distant others. He was broken in a way no one could fix, by no fault of his own, and had made the decision to stay away from a child who could not handle that brokenness. He wondered what had broken his father? He had never met Watto, Uncle Owen had made sure of that, and the Toydarian had been long dead when Luke had looked after the Rebellion, when trying to understand his father. The tales people told hadn’t painted him as a cruel master, just a careless one, and Luke wondered if that was not somehow worse. That negligence, for all Watto’s gambling had won his father his freedom, that callous disregard for care for his possessions, hadn’t fractured something in Anakin. He hadn’t dared asked the man to his face when his force ghost visited, such things were best left in the past. But he wondered. And it was a piece of why his father clung so hard to people, to the point of suffocation.
He looked up at a splash, as Mara Jade sent the rocks, water and fish back to the river, then flipped upright and caught one of the sticks. She regarded him with the utmost solemnity then Force tossed him one of the sticks and twitched hers like a sabre. Yes, he loved this woman, so very dearly. She understood him, when he needed to talk, or when he needed to just be. If to just be meant getting scratched up in a stick spar, then he was all for it.
It was midday when they sat with their feet in the cool water, and ate the ration bars Luke had had in a pouch. Neither of them were up to returning to the school just yet. They were both in need of nature, and the peace it soaked into the soul. The river rushed over the rocks and burbled as it went, and endless soothing sound that drew tension with it. The bird calls were quieter now, though a frog had taken up sounding the occasional croak in the rockier area just further down the river.
“You’ve been past Chandrila for these,” she bit into the last of her ration bar, “it actually has flavour, unlike the Imperial rations.”
Luke laughed; Leia hadn’t been impressed to find him stocking up on army rations when she helped supply his school with a very balanced diet for all the various beings attending. He had explained they were for emergencies, and for himself only, and wasn’t it good to be prepared?
“The one in the green package was the worst,” he said with a shudder.
“No, the silver package,” Mara Jade said with feeling, “that one you had to soak in water for five minutes before you could eat it without cracking your teeth!”
It was a lovely afternoon spent, reminiscing incidentals of the worst food they had eaten, or the worst way a mission could turn on one, and laughing at each other’s misfortune.
It was cool and the shadows were long, and the light slanted in strips through the dust motes in the air. One fell on Mara Jade’s hair and made it glow like fire as they lay sprawled out on their backs on his cloak, pointing out shapes in the canopy above and naming what animals they looked like. Luke would treasure this memory for all his years, and beyond.
“It was a vision of the future,” he said, after Mara Jade named a cluster of leaves a gundark.
She hummed and pressed her arm a little more firmly against his.
“I know Master Yoda said that the future is always in motion,” he had had that exact conversation with the Master’s Force ghost the evening after he had retrieved his crystal. “But when I spoke to Ben and my father, they both warned me that trying to change things could also bring it about.”
Mara Jade snorted.
“If the future were immutable, then the Emperor would still rule. What warning did it give?”
“A student,” he said, unable to name them, because he couldn’t, not that child, “turned, and I, I attacked them, forcing them away from the school.”
“You?” Mara Jade drew herself up on her elbow and stared down at him, her red hair glowing copper in the golden sunlight, “attacked a child?”
Luke stared at her, feeling suffocated, the vision had been as clear as the one he had had of facing himself as Darth Vader.
He nodded.
“Luke,” she said, exasperated, “what does the Dark Side do?”
“Show you the worst version of yourself.”
“And what do Force trials do?”
“Show you the, oh, that was a Dark trial and I failed it, again.” He groaned and lay back, then began to laugh with mirthless hysteria.
“You didn’t fail,” she flopped back down and elbowed him, causing his ragged laughter to became gasps. “You just didn’t think about it clearly.”
He managed to calm somewhat and lay with his hands on his stomach, breathing slow and deep as the mania that had gripped him bled off, leaving exhaustion in its wake. He ploughed through it.
“It’s a warning, like the Darth Vader as me was a warning.”
“Yes, and no,” Mara Jade said, “you see truer than most, Luke, so yes, it is something to be aware of. The students are sensitive, they can feel distrust and the like even if you’re never speak it or act it. They will feel the distrust you unconsciously give them with this knowledge in your heart. That is the trial Luke, that is what the kyber is testing your heart over. That you will take the moment’s thought and trust in the goodness of people, instead of worrying over the possibility of the bad.”
He turned and stared at her, his whole being shocked still and somehow clear of the webs of cloying doubt that had clung. His eyes prickled with tears but he blinked them away.
“The focus determines the destination, if you watch the rocks at the side of the road, you’ll more likely drive your speeder into them, than if you kept your eyes on the road and flew true.”
“Exactly.”
“I never thought of the Dark side as rocks.”
Mara Jade snorted with laughter.
“Imagine,” she gasped when she could talk, “Emperor Darth Rockius—”
“With the Death Star as a boulder—”
They walked home arm in arm, still giggling, and yelling defiant war cries every time they landed on a particularly large boulder.
As the school came into view in the gloaming of the day, the golden light blazing from the windows and the calls of the children at play, Luke felt something settle in his heart. The peace of the river, and forest, had seeped into his soul. The laughter had cleared his mind, and the kyber crystal he had in the pouch on his belt would become his next lightsaber. He would forge ahead, his eye on the light and take each rock as it came. No possibility of a rock would deviate his path, the Force would guide him true, as it always had. The Force was with him, always.