#i'm...not sorry

–

They stay in touch, sort of—Anakin sends herletters, more than occasionally but less than frequently, and Padmé alwaysresponds.  The link, the humming cord inthe Force, isn’t strong enough to do more than carry vague impressions, but itstays bright and strong in her mind as she carefully teaches herself more ofthe Force.  

She’s not sure how she feels about the Jedi,to be frank, and Anakin is so lonely. Obi-wan is a good man, but she can feel, along the thin-stretched linkto Anakin, thick, sticky ripples of sadness flavored with the bitter taste ofguilt.  

She goes out and does some research, and thenshe’s sure about the Jedi.  Emotionalcontrol is all well and good, Padmé is a politician and understands thesethings.  But emotions are strength andfire and life, anger drives passion and passion gets things done, and Anakin has so much passion tooffer that the Jedi are so determined to quash.

Padmé goes out and finds a gift, a paired setof Force stones that cost more than she’d like to admit, and writes a letter—a real letter, paper and ink under herhands—to accompany one to Coruscant.  Thestones aren’t designed to do anything in particular, just a pretty bauble forthe wealthy to boast about, but she knows how to feel for the Force and she’salways been good at odd tricks.  Sheneeds something to strengthen her bond with Anakin, something that will givehim someone in the galaxy who welcomes his heart as well as his strength in theForce, and these should do perfectly. She presses a kiss to the letter beside her name, leaving a faint printof red lipstick there, and sends it off with a courier to the Jedi Temple.

Thank you, Padmé, his voice murmurs in her ear when he picksup the stone for the first time, and she hides a smile behind the mask ofAmidala.

–

I don’t know if I can do this,Anakin whispers to her, years later. It’s mid-morning on Naboo, and one of the precious few days that Amidalais not needed.  Padmé is stretchedcomfortably on the edge of a lake, watching Sabé creep up behind Saché and dunkher forcefully under the water, and, until just now, she’d been peacefullywondering what was for lunch.

She sits up, and Sabé’s head pops upattentively.  Padmé waves her off, justin time for Saché to get her revenge and yank Sabé’s feet out from under her,and closes her hand around the stone fixed into a pendant.

Ani?  Are you okay?

They just—they want me to feel nothing and I don’t know if I can do it.

Padmé half-snarls, and Anakin’s mental touchwavers for a moment before she snatches him back and sends a soothing wave ofcalm at him.  I’m not angry with you.  Ani, theJedi can’t tell you what to feel.

I just.  I want tobe good at this, I shouldbe good at this.

You are, she says, and sends him a gentle touch, thesensation of a hand sliding over hair.  They’re not your masters, no matter whatyou’re supposed to call them.

There’s a pause, and she feels her words hitlike a hammer, like he hasn’t even considered them before.  Force, she’s going to kill someone, killAnakin’s old master like she should have. She’s been trying to bring theslave trade under the Republic’s eye and it’s been a war, every step a slogagainst dozens and hundreds of people who dance around the truth—that theydon’t want to put their energy into the slave trade because it’s easier this way.  And she just…Padmé believes in democracy, shedoes, but she also wishes that she had the power to point her finger and say end this and bring the hammer downwithout another word.  Anger curdles inher stomach and she welcomes it, lets the warmth wash over her and into thelink like an amber tide, and she feels the cautious way Anakin reaches for it,lets it touch him—because, she realizes with a rush of something else,something darker and just as warm, he trusts her.  He believes that Padmé, his angel, couldnever lead him wrong.  And shewon’t.  She’s going to protect him.

You can be angry at them,she tells him, pulling his mental presence closer.  You canfeel anything you want.  You can doanything, Ani, because I’m going to help make sure of it.

He reaches back for her and sends a shy touchalong the bond, a kiss to the high apple of her cheek, and she smiles.

–

They meet again, and she discovers thatAnakin, who is so shy and articulate over their bond, is a fucking mess in person.  It’sunspeakably endearing, and a terrible relief, because somehow the littlesunlight-haired boy she remembers has grown up into…Anakin.  And goodness. He’s very…tall.  When most peoplewere learning to flirt, Padmé was hauling Naboo out of the flames after theinvasion, and it’s only the fact that Anakin is actually worse than her thatpreserves her dignity.  He holds her handand kisses her knuckles like he did as a little boy and goes on a franklyadorably pointless rant about sand, and Padmé can’t help herself.  

This is mine, she thinks as they go to war and then intohiding.  And she kisses Anakin’s cheekand leaves a mark there, like the mark she once left on a letter.

–

She knows what Anakin is about to do beforehe does.  It rips through her, his griefand the blind yellow tide of his rage, and nono no mother please I came back please no. Her own anger flares in answer to his—how dare someone touch what ishers, what she has placed under her protection—and she reaches along the bondwhen she feels him cry out for help, someone to save his mother.

Padmé, he half-screams, throwing the image of hismother at her, unbreathing in his arms.  What do I do?

She’s torn for a moment, because she knowsshe should tell him to bring the raiders in for legal proceedings but she wants…

It’s her heartbeat of indecision that makesthe choice, the split second where his direct line into her soul plunges pastthe surface morality to the dark heart that cries out for vengeance, to destroythese people as she has wanted to destroy the slave holders they’ve passed hereon Tatooine.  The yellow tide rises andblots out her thoughts, blots out her sight and hearing, until she can only seeAnakin, tears on his face as his lightsaber rises, falls, rises, falls, andleaves destruction in his wake.

When he comes back to the homestead, hecrumples onto the floor at her feet and buries his face in her lap, and shewinds her fingers into his hair and kisses the crown of his head and croonsmindlessly to him, wrapping them both in the warmth of her dark heart.

–

Anakin loses an arm.  Padmé, planets away, screams in hate andfury, and lightning seems to crackle through her veins, blue-white sparksshowering at her fingertips.

When he comes back, she sneaks into themedbay and christens his new mechanical arm with a kiss to the knuckles, justlike he did when they first met.

–

So they get married.  

No, really.

It’s a secret, because Anakin, Force helphim, still wants to be a Jedi, and she would never try to take something hewanted from him.  But it’s a delight, andthe link between them glitters and hums, and the Force sings yesssssss and Anakin grins like a foolas Padmé giggles through her vows.  Andthen they’re declared wedded forever in the eyes of the Force, and she throwsher arms around his neck and pulls him down. His arms are strong around her, metal and flesh, and his lips are softon hers and that dark, hungry thing in her heart wraps him up and declares him hers.

–

They go to war.  It’s terrible, and Padmé has to cling to themoments where she sees Anakin, where she can run her hands through his longhair and hold onto him.  He looks wearierevery time she sees him, with new terrible stories and warnings of the SithLord.  The guilt-bitter taste whenevershe feels him push away his emotions is stronger than ever, and Padmé wants toscream.  The Jedi had their problemsbefore, yes, but now they’re clearer than ever. Force, Anakin’s padawan is achild still, and she and his soldiers are the only ones who don’t recite themantra of emotional control when he reaches out.  She feels the keening grief shock along thebond like lightning every time one of the 501st dies, and there’snothing she can do but hold on and try to give Anakin an anchor point as they loseground in the war.  

Padmé does some research, much like when shewas a little girl first figuring out how to use the Force.  This time, she just needs help, and she’ll read anything she canget her hands on for it.

That’s how she finds the first book.  It’s in an incredibly archaic form ofAurebesh, and it radiates something dark and hungry, and when she sits down andlooks at the first page, the letters seem to ripple.

The book open in front of her, Padmé sitsdown on the floor, legs folded under her wide formal skirt, and she summons upall her yellow-gold rage to boil at the surface.  Anakin, engaged in a battle parsecs away,doesn’t notice beyond the haze of his own. She opens her palm and lets the anger hit the flash point, and it seemsto vaporize, into a bright spark of blue-white electricity arching from herfingertips to a decorative sand garden on her desk.  There’s a deafening crack and a sibilant yessssand Padmé is gasping with it, with the power,and now Anakin has definitely noticed.

Padmé? he asks in alarm.

I’m fine, love, she says, unfolding herself from theground.  She picks up the glass sheet thesand has melted into, without regard for the heat, and looks at itcuriously.  

I felt Darkness—

Just me, Ani, she says, and gives the glass a curioustwist in her hand.  

Padmé…

We need firepower to win this war, Ani,she says, watching the shimmer of something gold in her reflection.  She doesn’t remember putting on any jewelry.  Please,she whispers down the bond.  I have to do something to help you.  I can’t watch this anymore.  She shoves her memories at him, of watchingAnakin’s eyes darken and Ahsoka’s light dim, of her years and years ofstruggling to bring attention to the slave trade.  I’mdone trying to do it their way, now I’m going to do it mine.  Do you trust me?

His anxiety unravels into easy warmth, and hetouches her mind gently.  Of course, angel.  There’s a burst of fear and she sees a flashof his lightsaber as he fends off an attack. Maybe you can teach me some ofthat firepower, he adds, his mental voice breathless.

Of course, Ani, she says, and presses a kiss to the glass,below the place where yellow-gold glitters.

–

Padmé is pregnant.  It’s wonderful.  It’s terrible.  The galaxy is at war.  Anakin has never been so delighted.

She feels the heat of the Dark thing in herheart flood out into her veins and wraps her child tight in its power, feelingthe unquenchable sun of Force energy sing back to her.  She feels the nascent link in her mind andsends them a kiss, and tells Anakin, “I’m going to end this war.  For them.”

He looks back, at her eyes that shudder goldnow when she touches the Force, and says, “I’ll help.”

–

She’s had about seven months to unravel theSith Lord’s identity and she’s so close she can almost taste it when Anakinbursts wild-eyed into her chambers.  Thebond is such clanging disarray she can barely hear herself think, and he dropsto his knees and presses his face into her skirt like he did as a young man.  Padmé reaches for him with hands and Force,wraps him up in the soft warmth of the Darkness she’s been summoning so easily,and croons quietly to him until he stops shaking.

It’s Palpatine, he thinks helplessly at her once his mind isquiet.  “Palpatine is the Sith Lord, hewants to be Emperor, and—and the Jedi don’t believe me!” he says aloud, half ashout.  “Yoda’s going to confront himalone, and I—I’ve served them for yearsand they don’t believe me!”

“I believe you, Ani,” Padmé whispers, and helooks up at her, eyes wide and very young. “I do.”

“What do I do?” Anakin breathes.  “He wants me to be his apprentice.”

“The Rule of Two,” Padmé muses—she’s betterversed in Sith lore than most Jedi, by now, because Anakin tells her his warstories and her research has not always, perhaps, been strictly of theLight.  She’s always been better attouching the Force through anger and love and hate and passion, anyway.  “He wantsto be the Master.”  Anakin nods and sheraises a hand to cup the sharp angle of his cheek.  “What do youwant, Ani?”

Anakin sits quiet for a long time, at peacekneeling at Padmé’s feet in a way she rarely feels when he’s in the field.  “He believes I’m afraid of the Dark Side,”Anakin says finally.  “But you—I’m notafraid of you.”  He catches her hand andkisses the knuckles.  “I want to do whatyou want me to do,” he says, lips still against her skin.  “Whatever will keep you safe, and happy, andable to help the people you want to help.”

“I don’t think you can do that as a Jedi,Ani,” Padmé says quietly, because she has never lied to him but it aches to think she might be takingsomething from him.  He doesn’t flinch ather words.

“Then I’m done with the Jedi,” Anakin says,and looks up at her with eyes that shiver gold. “He called me Vader—Darth Vader. He said that I would be his weapon.”

“But you don’t want that?”

“No,” Anakin says.  “I knew the moment I saw you that I wasyours.”

“Good,” Padmé says, and finally lets her darkheart boil up and stain her eyes, through and through.  Darth Vader,she sends to Anakin, half-playful.

Darth Amidala, he replies, and she smiles.  “How can I serve you, my lady?” he asks, witha note of formality in his voice.

Darth Amidala reaches down and takes herhusband’s hands and stands, drawing him up to his feet.  Reaching up, she cups his face and says,“Palpatine wants an Empire, with Darth Vader as its strong arm?  Fine. He’ll have it.”  She bringsAnakin’s face to hers and whispers, “Bring me Darth Sidious’ head.”