trans_9 | Get you Gone

"You guys will be fine," Luke said. "You're here, and you've got Obi-Wan and my father, in addition to the others staying behind, so don't worry about it."

He nodded, drawing a deep breath and letting it out. "And don't worry about me, either. My ally is the Force--and, well..." his thoughts drifted to Mara. "...everyone else on the team."

"I will worry anyway," she grumbled softly. "I cannot help that, now." She pinpointed him with an intense, glittering stare that ought to have sliced him clean through. "You will come back because if you do not, I will be most displeased."

It mattered not what had passed between them, he was a good friend and his lost would not be tolerated easily.

"But you have Mara Jade," Arha said quietly. "I suspect she is more backup than a room full of troops. Perhaps I shall not worry overmuch, save for the fact that I am not there to back the both of you up myself."

That look did its job, cutting straight to the core of him. He smiled, partly for her benefit and partly for his own, because that place in him that had held budding affection had just twinged, remind him painfully that it was there.

"We'll be all right," he said. "And really, don't worry, I'll come back. I promise."

She studied him for a long and fiercely intense moment, then promptly hugged him tight. Things sometimes did not work the way one expected and she would be damned if he was going anywhere without a hug at the least. Her words were sharper than her hug, which was far softer and warmer.

"I will hold you to that promise, Luke Skywalker," she said against his shoulder. "May the Force keep you, then, and bring you home safe. I wish to be cut in two, so that I could be in all places, but it is not so. All I may do," Arha murmured, "is tell you to be careful, to fight well, and to--"

She pulled away.

"A promise is a promise." It was a bad promise. It was one that was easily broken. "Do you best to come back, Jed-Eye. I shall do my best here." She frowned for a moment then reached for one of her crysknives which she pressed into his hand. The milky white of it glistened in what light there was.

"Take it with you even if you never draw it. When you come back, you may return it. This way, perhaps I shall go with you as well as stay here."

Edited 2009-10-14 03:16 (UTC)

He looked at it in surprise. "Are you sure?" he asked, blue eyes wide. "I mean, you might need it..."

Come to think of it, he'd never seen Arha or Sheeana without these strange knives. It was part and parcel of who they were, he thought. To give one to him was, Luke guessed, quite an honor.

"I have another," she said quietly, brushing her hand against the other knife she wore. "They are carved from the same tooth. Most Fremen carry only one. I would not have offered if I was unsure. It is one of the most precious things to a Fremen. Few men have seen these blades and lived as we do not draw them without cause."

It was a serious thing, not a mere tool, not just a knife.

"As your lightsaber is, thus is my crysknife." Her fingers brushed over the hilt of her remaining knife. "Keep it close to you." Arha ran a forefinger along the blade and nicked her fingertip with its point. "Draw it for your life, sheathe it only when it has tasted blood."

She watched the nick on her finger bead right red.

Luke watched her blood bead up too, and felt a primal shiver run down his back. Fremen; the people of the desert that they had spoken of. It was a dangerous, wild thing, and a precious thing to give to someone. Its importance wasn't lost on Luke--nor was the significance of her giving it to him at all, particularly when she spoke of it thus.

"I'll keep it by me," he said, feeling the heft of it in his hand. It felt balanced and right to him, like the blaster he'd chosen had felt right. Perhaps it was because, like the blaster, it was like a gift from a friend.

"Hopefully I won't have to use it. Arha..." he bit his lip as he looked at her, unspoken words coming to his mind and being discarded. A Jedi Master, lost for words--that was something that didn't happen every day. Finally, he settled on the simplest, most sincere thing. "Thank you."

"It dies with you," Arha murmured, "as it lives with you." A smile ghosted across her face and she nodded just once. There was a piece of herself in that knife born of nearly a full year shaping and carving and inlaying. Cold desert nights, blazing days, determined spirit. All of this had been put into the craftsmanship of that knife.

"You are welcome," she said quietly. "May it serve you will as it has done on my behalf." Arha paused. "Know that it has tasted blood but never killed. That ou may feel in the blade itself if you look deep enough."

That first comment seemed an ominous thing to say before a mission like this one, and Luke eyed her warily. "I'm not going to die," he said. "At least, I hope I don't. There are enough of us for it to be pretty safe if we stick together."

He bowed deep. "I'll make sure it doesn't kill now," he said when he straightened. "Though I'm grateful for the extra protection. Do you have a sheath I can put it in?"

"You better not die," she said flatly and removed her makeshift sheath before passing it to him. "It is...a phrase we Fremen use. The only thing that keeps your knife from disintegrating is its proximity to your body's electrical field. When it is gone, the knife is gone."

She was silent for awhile.

"I have wished Fremen troops well before battle," Arha said, "many times. You cannot pick out the ones who will come back as water. Each time I wished them well, it was a goodbye in case they fell. They were all fine warriors, but the jihads were..." She shrugged lightly and pulled her eyes from him.

"You will come back," she said softly. "And I will still be here. I am forever waiting for men to come back from battle, it seems." A shadow of a smile touched her lips and she fixed her eyes on his. "Fight well, my Jed-Eye, and may your path lead you back here." Her chin tilted slightly and her smile was bright.

"Ah," she murmured. "May the Force be with you. Yes? This is how you say it?"

Luke slid the knife into its sheath and buckled the whole onto his belt, behind his lightsaber. Getting a regular arsenal going here, he thought, brushing the carved hilt with his fingers. It felt comforting to him, somehow. "May the Force be with you too, Arha." There was the weight of something between them, in that moment of silence after he spoke, a weight that could have been filled, but after it passed he bowed his head to her again and turned away, rejoining the group waiting to leave.

She watched him go until he was lost to the crowd, then slowly sat. It was, once again, to the Force that she reached and let its calm wrap around her like a shield. Be safe. The thought lingered, echoing for a moment before she retreated to the stillness of her mind. She meditated in the Force itself and let the frenzy of thought subside.

He had her crysknife. It was the closest she could come to going with him while remaining in this place. Everything was bearable, no matter what the outcome. Arha would look forward to seeing his face once more; she always did.

Edited 2009-10-14 23:48 (UTC)

Get you Gone

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