masterofbirds requested his Shae'lah and her brothers. I had to oblige!
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Lord Elatar was fidgeting noticeably. His large arms were crossed over his chest and he shifted his weight from one foot to the other, over and over again.
“My lord.” A strong, red hand, slightly age-worn and rough, rested on his forearm. “Be at peace. You will be fine.”
“It’s not me I’m worried about,” the newly-christened Sith Lord said to Darth Oboa, his one-time master. Sukhera was still hairless and handsome, and the years had only put jovial lines of laughter on her red skin. Elatar smiled at the sheer faith in the woman’s gaze. Of course he would be fine. Sukhera had seen to that. Years of sparring in the backyard. Being knocked on his back again, and again, and again -- he had fought her incessantly until he beat her.
She had cried out for him to yield and had promoted him on the spot.
“The twins.” Sukhera nodded solemnly. “You’re worried about them?”
Elatar chuckled, thinking of his little brother Araehn’s tendency to just fight until he was knocked out -- and the way it was tempered by Shae’lah’s uncanny ability to tweak health in the Force. “They’ll be great,” he said, an easy smile on his face, “but --” He came to a stop and lowered his arms. “What if I can’t protect them? What if I can’t do what I was born to do?”
“You can,” Sukhera smiled and took Elatar’s large hand in both of hers, squeezing tightly. “The three of you stay together and everything becomes possible.” Then her face grew serious and she looked into his eyes. “And you are your father’s son.”
“Yeah.” He was going to say something further when he felt a distinct thump against his back.
“Tell me something. Why is it, that on the day we get to leave, you’re sitting here being all glum?” Araehn was more his mother’s son than anything; brash and kind. He wore an easygoing grin marred only by the scars of old piercings that never took. And he’d been Elatar’s shadow from the day he was born.
Elatar laughed. “Just thinking about how terrible it’s going to be to haul your ass around the galaxy.” He grunted as Araehn elbowed him solidly in the ribs. He was just about to retaliate by tackling him to the ground when --
“The two of you,” came a high, thin voice with a crisp Imperial accent, “can never stop horsing around for one moment, can you?” Shae’lah was tiny where the men were wide; thin where they were bulky. She looked rather fragile but she kept up alongside the two of them. “Besides, we all know it’s me who’s going to do the arse-dragging.”
“It’s gonna be just like it always is, isn’t it?” Elatar shook his head bemusedly. “The three of us, and -- “
Shae’lah smiled, getting up on tiptoes to ruffle at Elatar’s hair. “And we’ll take the galaxy by storm.”
Araehn nudged Elatar in the ribs again, but then looped his arm around his brother’s shoulders. “Just remember where we came from,” he said earnestly, lifting his other arm so that Shae’lah could wedge herself in between them, “The Force is on our side.”
It was.
They came from greatness and glory. From prophecy and tragedy. They had fought each other and their masters until they bled and blacked out; they had learned the mysteries of the Force until the air was thick with ozone and they could barely breathe. They had learned.
Her child loved the garden. It was the brightest spot in the entire compound; a small grassy plot with fruit trees and a fish pond and a few lazy blurrgs that spent their time sunning themselves on the boulders spaced throughout.
Hanneke sat in the grass, her head tilted back to enjoy the unexpected sunlight on Dromund Kaas, when Elatar’s happy gurgle caught her attention. She cast her eyes back down to see him sitting up amongst the grass, blades of green poking out from between the fingers of his chubby brown-orange fist. He noticed her looking at him and smiled widely, an endearing gap-toothed grin as he held out his hand.
“Mama,” he said, holding out his grass-filled hand, his yellow eyes wide with wonder. Hanneke laughed, scooting herself back a few paces.
“What do you have, honey?” She held out her hands, beckoning him to come toward her.
Elatar frowned slightly, looked down at his hand and back up at his mother, and reached again. “Mama.” His tone was insistent and he stared at Hanneke, looking extremely put out at the fact that she wasn’t coming to pick him up.
“Come here,” Hanneke said, a soft smile on her face, “and show me what you’ve found.”
He did. She watched in awe, her heart swelling as Elatar took his very first steps. He didn’t quite know what to do with his own legs, but he stood up and took a few stumbling steps straight into her arms, tripping at the end such that the handful of grass flew into her face.
“Well done,” she breathed, lifting him into her arms, the proudest she’d ever felt. He giggled and nuzzled her neck. “You’ll have to show your father later.”
