Private Come With Me Unto This Lakeshore

[Efret Farr]

Lake Country was quiet, the kind of quiet that reflected one's memories back to them like crystal clear water.

And Efret Farr need that kind of quiet, for she had much to look back upon.

Her encounters with Malva'ikh. Her time as Chief Curator. The relationships that could have been with Astri, with Cailen, with Fenn. With Elias.

She was dwelling on the past, something she often cautioned others not to do, not that she had advised anyone of anything of late. It wouldn't make her a hypocrite even if she had though. She come to understand as an older padawan that it wasn't the dwelling that could break a person's spirit. It was for what reason the dwelling was done.

Was it to yearn in vain for something bygone, to give into despair for the loss? Or was it to shoulder failure just to cast it off before its weight became too much—to feel it so intensely as to disarm it of much of its power—to build it a fence and come to visit so that it didn't feel the need to come visit you?

Though that kind of discipline was hard to teach, it had always served Efret well and continued to as she meditated on the lakeshore. She seemed at peace with her eyes lightly closed, head bowed slightly to the ground, palms upturned on her thighs. Besides the gentle breeze playing with the wisps of her long, loose hair, she appeared entirely undisturbed. The very picture of an idealized stoic Jedi of old.

But her temperature was rising, her heart beginning to thump against her ribs, as she opened herself up to it all: fear, panic, misery, self-loathing, hopelessness. Her breath in was deep but wavered on the exhale. It joined the wind skimming off the water and swirled away, leaving her no calmer but helping her ease deeper into the emotions of her past.

Aiden Porte​

 

[Aiden Porte]

Efret Farr​

Aiden's boots made the softest crunch along the lakeshore, the pebbles shifting underfoot in a way that sounded louder only because everything else out here seemed determined to whisper. The air carried that clean, sharp bite that always came off open water in the colder seasons, and the lake itself lay spread out like polished glass, so still it felt like it could reflect more than sky if you stared too long.

Beside him, Lira looked like she might float away on sheer wonder.

Her gaze kept darting from the distant line of dark pines to the pale horizon and back again, drinking in every shimmer of light on the water's surface as if it was the first beautiful thing she had ever been allowed to keep. She kept close to Aiden's side, not from fear, but she wanted him there to see it with her, to share it the way children shared treasures. Aiden found himself smiling effortlessly. It was the kind of smile that felt older than the day itself, like it came from a place in him that had survived wars, loss, and long nights, and still remembered how to soften when something good dared to exist.

Lira broke into a quick trot toward the water's edge, her boots slipping slightly on the damp stones. She crouched, the hem of her coat brushing the shore, and extended her fingers toward the lake like she was greeting something alive.

The moment her fingertips dipped beneath the surface, she yanked her hand back with a little gasp, eyes going wide.

"Oh it's so cold!"

Aiden's chuckle escaped him, warm and easy, carried away by the wind. "Yes," he agreed, stepping up beside her. "The lake will be a little on the cold side for a few more weeks, probably."

Lira shook her hand dramatically as if the water had personally offended her, then laughed anyway, bright and unguarded, before peering back out across the lake with renewed respect. She looked like she was already planning a rematch with the temperature when spring arrived.

Then her attention seemed to divert just a bit. Her curious mind pointing out anything and everything. She straightened and squinted down the shoreline, head tilting slightly as though she had spotted a detail the rest of the world had missed. "Hey, Aiden… who is that?" Aiden followed her line of sight.

At first it was just a figure seated near the water, still as a statue, hair lifted faintly by the breeze. Then the Force caught up to what his eyes were seeing, brushing against his awareness with a familiar shape, quiet discipline, old steadiness, a presence that felt like history set carefully in order instead of left scattered on the floor. His expression softened. His breath left him in a small, almost disbelieving exhale.

Aiden narrowed his eyes, not with suspicion, but with the instinctive focus not scanning a scene for threads, but now found something he had not expected to find: a kindness the galaxy had not managed to take away. A small, happy sigh slipped from him before he could stop it.

"That," he murmured, voice gentler than before, "is an old friend…."

He rested a hand lightly at the back of Lira's shoulder, steadying, guiding, reassuring, then began to angle them toward the seated woman at an unhurried pace. He did not want to startle the stillness out of the moment. He did not want to come at it like a soldier.

For once, he wanted to approach like a Jedi. And like someone who, against all odds, was genuinely glad to be here.

 

[Efret Farr]

Aiden saw one old friend.

He'd hear another.

A triplet of hoots broke the stillness of the wintery air. If he looked up, he would see a familiar convor. The Force stirred in her, tracing a confusing pattern. Aiden might recognize feelings of excitement to see him again after all of this time, but there was something else there. Something complex and not straightforward.

Nirrah alighted on a boulder half exposed by the lake's current water level. Her big, yellow-green eyes regarded the beings in front of her. As she blinked and her eyelids opened again, purple flecks danced in her irises like ash disturbed by a gust of wind after a forest fire—evidence of her time in the Netherworld. She spread one wing wide over the path Aiden and Lira were cutting.

Another hoot came from her, this one much lower.

Sad? Not quite. Just soft, like she was requesting they be gentle with Efret.

Yes, that was it. It felt right and it made sense. Though Elias had couldn't have done any more, he hadn't saved her that fateful day in Theed. He had pushed her from the Netherworld during by the Second Cataclysm, but, even as her knees hit the cobblestones of the city center, part of her remained on the wrong side of the rift. It had remained trapped with him and Nirrah.

It hadn't returned when they had.

This time, the Force stirred in Efret, pulling tight over her like water tension. Aiden might have felt a tugging, not hard enough to actually move him nor to be quite uncomfortable, though he might also get the feeling that it was quite so for Efret.

But it broke almost as quickly as it had taken form. The Force's hold on both of them relaxed. Efret's memories fell away from her like a discarded robe. As they slumped to the ground around her, she stood and looked over at Nirrah.

A smile that couldn't have been moments before took over the older Jedi's face. She reached down to flick a small switch on the back of her necklace pendant with her thumbnail as she approached them.

"Aiden!" The slightly tinny voice of her relocated interpretation until didn't exclaim, but it was clear that she would if she spoke for herself; her hazel eyes almost glowed and her brows raised in pleasure to see him. She threw her arms around him and gave him a hug that held within it not just two friends but the grief that they shared for a father and for a faction, as well as the gratefulness that those two things had ever existed as to bring them together in the first place. When she pulled and stepped back, she began signing again. "It's so good to see you." She turned her gaze to Lira, still smiling warmly. "Hello, my dear. My name is Efret."

She hoped that Aiden understood her omitting her title of master as intentional rather than a mistake.

"And this is Nirrah," she added, gesturing to the owl. "It's very nice to meet you."

After Lira had made her introduction, Efret and Nirrah's shared focus shifted up to Aiden again. The Jedi master wanted to say plenty more, but much of it was not meant for young ears, so she stayed quiet for now.

Aiden Porte​

 

[Aiden Porte]

Efret Farr​

Aiden's smile lingered, softening the lines that years of responsibility had carved into his face. For a moment, he simply looked at Efret, really looked like he was making sure the Force was not playing a cruel trick on him. The lake wind teased at the ends of his hair, but he barely seemed to notice it. All his attention was on her, on the fact that she was standing here, breathing, here.

His eyes warmed, and a quiet, almost disbelieving laugh slipped out of him. It was not mocking. It was the kind of sound a person made when relief finally found a crack in their composure.

"Efret…" he said again, as if tasting the name made it more real. His voice carried an easy affection that he did not try to hide. "You have no idea how good it is to see you."

He let out a slow breath and shook his head once, the corner of his mouth lifting further. "I thought..." He stopped himself before the thought could turn into something darker, something that belonged behind closed doors and far away from Lira's ears. Instead, he chose the truth that mattered most in this moment. "I hoped. I always hoped. But seeing you standing here is… it is a gift."

Aiden's hand rose, hesitated, then gently settled at Efret's upper arm in a brief, grounding touch, careful, respectful, the way he touched people when he wanted them to know they were safe without making a spectacle of it. His thumb pressed lightly, then released, as their arms wrapped around each other. He was so happy to see her, he finally let her go as he glanced down to Lira.

"This is Lira," he said, his pride understated but unmistakable. "My daughter. She has been making it her personal mission to befriend every beautiful thing she finds, including lakes that are clearly trying to freeze her fingers off."

If Lira laughed or huffed at that, Aiden's eyes crinkled with amusement, and then his gaze returned to Efret, steadier, softer.

"I mean it," he said, quieter now, the sincerity plain in every word. "I am happy you are here. I have missed you." A faint smirk tugged at his mouth, playful but kind. "And I am going to be selfish for a moment and ask that you let me have a little time with you today, if you are willing. Even if it is just a walk."

His eyes flicked once toward Nirrah, and he offered the convor a small, respectful nod, then back to Efret.

 

[Efret Farr]

It was a curious thing that Efret and Aiden considered each other old friends. They had only met each other once—and relatively briefly at that. Normally, their relationship wouldn't be categorized any higher that acquaintance, but given the amount of time that had passed since their meeting, even that could be contentious.

The circumstances that had come to pass during that stretch of time, though, was what elevated their bond to a true friendship. Yes, they didn't know each other on a personal level, but that is not necessary to cultivate a deep level of care for another being. Still, getting to know your friends was always ideal and there would be plenty of time for that for the two Jedi. In fact, perhaps they would start making up for lost opportunities today.

As Aiden introduced Lira, Efret sidestepped a bit so she could still read his downturned lips.

"I am happy you are here. I have missed you."

"And I you," she replied sincerely.

Selfish. Efret couldn't help but scoff at the ridiculous notion. Not that she would even call it selfish herself, there was no harm whatsoever to be found in his request. "Of course I'm willing." Her gaze moved from him to the young girl beside him. "Lira, is it alright if Nirrah keeps you company? She's very friendly." Part of her really didn't want to request that Aiden and Lira separate, but she knew it was needed for the Jedi to speak without holding themselves back—and she felt that would do both Aiden and herself good. "I'd like to discuss some private matters with your father."

If either Aiden or Lira agreed, Efret would loose a small pouch from her saree's belt and hand it to the girl. "Dried mealworms," she explained. "Her favorite treats. She'll do tricks for them. Try it."

Aiden Porte​

 

[Aiden Porte]

Efret Farr​

Aiden felt the brightness in Lira like a small sunrise in the Force, pure excitement, uncomplicated and whole. The pouch of dried mealworms might as well have been treasure, and Nirrah's presence only made it better. Lira's earlier awe at the lake shifted into delighted purpose as she set about making a new friend.

Aiden's mouth curved into a wider smile, and he dipped his head toward her, voice warm and steady. "Have fun, kiddo. I'll be right here."

Lira nodded quickly, already halfway into motion, and then she was off, boots pattering over damp stones as she ran a short distance down the shore with Nirrah keeping watch nearby, wings shifting in a quiet, attentive way. Aiden tracked her automatically, eyes following the line of her small form against the pale winter water. He let his awareness stretch with the Force too, a gentle tether that told him she was safe, that her laughter was real, that the world had not reached for her in that moment.

Only when Lira had settled into her new game, offering treats, giggling at Nirrah's patient intelligence, did Aiden turn back.

He stepped closer to Efret, and the relief he had been holding behind his ribs finally found a place to rest. Without overthinking it, he slid an arm around her shoulders, careful of her balance and her space, and gave her a small, affectionate squeeze. It was a simple gesture, but it held lengths of missing and hoping, and the quiet gratitude of seeing her standing here at all.

Aiden smiled at her, the expression soft and genuine. His voice lowered, intimate without being heavy, like a friend leaning in after too long apart.

"Where have you been?" he asked, and there was warmth in the question, concern, curiosity, and a happiness he was not trying to hide.

 

[Efret Farr]

After Aiden's arm dropped back to his side after squeezing her, she asked, "May I take your arm?" She wasn't entirely sure that Aiden knew her to be Blind as well as Deaf; she hadn't ever told him directly, but perhaps Kahne had, for she had told him after eventually coming to her senses when they met shortly after the Second Cataclysm—when he had mistaken her silence for shock alone. Without Nirrah, she relied on others or independent aids to navigate safely.

If Aiden agreed, Efret looped an arm around his as they began to walk along the lakeshore. It made signing a little awkward, but she managed mostly with her free hand, only periodically using the other when needed for clarity.

"I've been here," she answered honestly, though she chose to keep the specifics out of her reply. "In Lake Country." The general location of her whereabouts was already privileged enough information that she hoped he felt the weight of her sharing even that much. "Please don't disclose that."

She entertained silence for a few beats. "I don't know if you've heard, but I resigned from the New Jedi Council some months before the Order dissolved. I've been here since. Found myself a quaint little villa. I suppose I'm squatting, but it's been abandoned for decades." Something about the sincerity baked into her features might let Aiden know that she had made absolutely sure of that fact. What he wouldn't know was just what that had entailed. She had asked around among the nearest farmers and glass craftspeople, as well as the roving shaak herders. On top of that, she had used psychometry.

"It's unfortunate that the meadows didn't flood as extensively as I'm told that they normally do," she mused suddenly. The statement seemed so unrelated to their last vein of conversation that Aiden might think it a gross misinterpretation from her programed unit, but what she said next held too much meaning to be accidental.

"Maybe next year will be different."

Her brow pulled together softly as she signed that.

Maybe next year there will be more water.

Maybe next year I'll find myself here.

Maybe next year I'll return to Theed.

She continued, changing the subject again, "The last time I communicated via comm with anyone was with one of the Jedi who was part of my archeological team. Her name is Pipma. She told me that many of the artifacts we had collected on Fondor were either destroyed or sold by Sith and their servants."

She had been looking at him this whole time, only glancing to the path periodically to make sure as much as she could that she wouldn't trip, but only now did her gaze seem to really bore into him, not with malice but sorrow. "Those beautiful Krayt dragon bones that you and Jun brought me... I'm very sorry, Aiden.

"I'm not in the habit of losing things."

That sentiment was well and good, but she was settling into one of leaving things unfinished, and those were in some ways much the same.

Aiden Porte​

 

[Aiden Porte]

Efret Farr​

Aiden kept his pace matched to Efret's, letting the rhythm of their steps become something steady the moment could lean on. The lake's cold air slid over his skin, but it was the warmth of her arm looped through his that grounded him. He could feel how carefully she was holding herself together, how much intention sat behind every sentence she chose to share and every detail she chose to leave out.

When she asked him not to disclose her location, he did not hesitate. Aiden's gaze stayed forward, but his answer was immediate and sincere, spoken with the quiet certainty of a promise he would rather die than break.

"I won't say a word," he assured her gently. "Not to anyone. This stays with me."

His expression softened further as he glanced toward the water, then back to her, as if the lake itself was witnessing the vow. "I did hear about that, and I'm so sorry. I'm just really glad you made it to this moment, Efret," he added, voice warm and earnest. "I know how hard it can be to keep moving forward when the world keeps trying to pull you backward."

He let a small, affectionate smile touch his mouth, a little light returning to his eyes. "We'll take next year as it comes,"

"Don't worry about the artifacts," he told her, calm and reassuring. "Just you being here is enough."

His eyes drifted briefly to where Lira was still occupied down the shore, bright and safe with Nirrah nearby. That sight, his daughter laughing while Nirrah watched over her, made his smile soften into something almost tender.

Then Aiden exhaled, and his voice shifted into a gentler kind of honesty.

"I hope Jun is doing well," he said quietly. "I haven't heard from her in a while, years. I don't expect that to change." He shook his head once, faintly, not frustrated so much as aching with the reality of it. "She's just… gone."

Aiden's thumb gave a small, absent stroke against the inside of his own palm where Efret held his arm, like the motion might smooth the edge off the thought.

He looked to Efret again, his expression open and kind. "But right now," Aiden said, letting warmth return to his voice, "I'm here. You're here. Lira's laughing. The lake is cold and the galaxy is still messy, but we're standing in a quiet place together."

He gave her arm a gentle, reassuring shift, almost a squeeze without closing his hand. "That's a very good day."

 

[Efret Farr]

The curtain began to slip.

The one that Efret had steamed in her mind until it was entirely smooth. The one that she had cast over her most complex feelings to make it seem like they weren't there, not out of guilt for their very existence but out of desire to be a rock for others when she felt like waterlogged sand.

That curtain began to slip, but she didn't attempt to pull it back into place.

At the same moment that her arm looped through Aiden's tightened, Efret turned her head and laid her cheek on his shoulder. If he said anything while she was here, she wouldn't catch it; she couldn't see his lips.

Tears welled up in her eyes.

So much had changed. Grief for that overwhelmed her and chased the air from her lungs. Her back rose and fell irregularly as she tried to regain what had been lost, but not to the point of hyperventilation.

Down the lakeshore, Nirrah alighted on a rock, coming out of a backwards flip meant more to entertain Lira than to earn herself a treat. Efret's emotional shift was like an invisible thread that pulled her attention from Lira to the retreating figures of the two Jedi for a moment. Then Nirrah returned her attention to the girl before her, ready to play further.

Efret's breathing pattern smoothed out again over the next few moments. Her tears, all unfallen, retreated back into her eyes like alpine glaciers over a particularly warm year. She pulled back to her original position at Aiden's side so that she could sign him a story. Before she began, she successfully suppressed the urge to apologize; she knew that she didn't have to with him.

"I came back to Coruscant from an archeological tour after Tython fell," she began. "I meant to return, but stayed. To prepare for war. To participate in it." Her brow rose with regret almost visible upon it. "I left so much unfinished..." It smoothed out quickly as she realized that wasn't unique to her. "I think many of us did," she added, referring the the Jedi who survived the NJO. "The New Jedi Order left a hole not just in the galaxy but in the hearts of its champions."

She paused when the realization that she was rambling caught up to her hands. She hadn't meant to share that much, not that she didn't want Aiden to know.

A shy look communicating apology crossed her face. "Please excuse my lack of focus. It's so good to speak of this after so long. But Tython. One of the first things I did when coming back to the Temple was arrange a ceremony for it. Like a funeral for someone who isn't gone but lost. No one came." Her thoughts drifted to Gene Kenobi as soon as she had said that. A smile gingerly touched her lips. "That's a lie. One Jedi did, but on accident."

The smile dimmed but didn't disappear completely. "Would you be interested in having that kind of ceremony?" she asked. "It doesn't need to be just for Coruscant. It could also be for all of the friends we miss. For the GA and NJO: the bastions of hope that left the galaxy a little darker."

Aiden Porte​

 

[Aiden Porte]

Efret Farr​

Aiden did not question the moment when Efret's composure slipped. He saw it in the way her arm tightened around his, in the way her cheek found his shoulder like it was the only steady ground she trusted. The lake wind moved through them and around them, but Aiden stayed still, somber in a way that did not demand explanation. He simply became what she needed, letting silence do the work words could not.

When she drew back and returned to his side, he did not treat it like something fragile that might break if he looked at it too directly. He met her gaze with quiet kindness, then shifted just enough so he could see her hands clearly as she signed. His attention held steady, patient and complete, as though the rest of the galaxy had finally learned how to wait.

The story she gave him settled into his chest with familiar weight. Tython. Coruscant. The New Jedi Order. The ceremony that no one came to. The ache of preparing for war and still being left with unfinished pieces that would never fit neatly back into place. He listened with the seriousness it deserved, his expression softening at the edges while the grief in his eyes remained honest.

When she finished and asked him, Aiden's answer did not hesitate.

His face warmed into a sweet, genuine smile, and he nodded once, firmly, so she could see the certainty in him before he spoke. Then he raised his hands and signed back to her, careful and clear.

I would love to do that.

He held her gaze as he continued, his hands steady, his expression gentle but resolute.

The galaxy is darker, but we cannot let that hope go out.

Aiden's eyes flicked briefly down the shoreline, where Lira's laughter still rang out in small bursts as Nirrah entertained her. The sound of it felt like proof that light still existed, even now. He looked back to Efret, and his smile softened into something deeply sincere.

He signed again, slower this time, as if the weight of the promise deserved to be carried carefully.

You will not have to face this alone anymore.

Aiden stepped just a little closer, the quiet reassurance of his presence matching the warmth in his expression. His hands moved one more time, the final line signed with the same certainty he carried into every vow he truly meant.

We are here. I am here. Always.

And he let the words linger between them like a small flame protected from the wind.

 

[Efret Farr]

Her smile remained diminished with the weight of the galaxy as it was now, but sharks of light seemed to brighten her hazel irises a shade as he began to sign. Someone caring enough to communicate with her on her terms never failed to warm her heart.

The galaxy is darker, but we cannot let that hope go out.

"Of course not," she agreed. Though he signed, her interpretation unit still spoke as she did the same. "It will kindle here on Naboo, throughout the High Republic, and beyond." She didn't have to qualify that with an I think; she knew.

Any small bit of light that had come into her face began to flicker away. "As for what I face..." She paused, looking out across the lake that she couldn't make much of. "I value your willingness, but this isn't a..." She looked back at him, biting the very corner of her lower lip. "...burden that can be shared. At least not at this stage.

"Your father was there for Elias. Elias was there for me." Tears pricked at her waterlines again. Her fingers began to tremble slightly as emotion overcame her again and she fought to stay afloat. "They were both brave and good. I was neither when they needed my reciprocity." She pressed her lips together pensively. Elias wasn't dead, at least not physically, but Efret hadn't seen him since the Second Cataclysm. Shortly after his return to Theed, when she had come to see him, his doctors had warned her about the fragility of his mind, so she had decided to have no contact with him. Though she hadn't asked his care team many questions out of respect for his medical privacy, she did know that it seemed like his time in the Netherworld had erased his memory of her. What else was gone or distorted?

"Things may have been different if I had been." The pause this time was spend to wipe her eyes. When she began to sign again after a grounding sigh, glints of sunlight caught on the tears now on her skin. "I failed them both." Her smile grew just a little despite herself. "Please don't say I didn't. It's not the Jedi way to deny the truth, but to learn from it."

She didn't meant to lecture, nor to make him an accomplice in her self-pity, but she also didn't want to even mull over words of false comfort. Self-pity was definitely part of her journey, but it wasn't the purpose. That nuance had bore itself deep into her aching heart where it could remind herself of its presence with every breath she inhaled.

"This is why I'm in Lake Country. To learn many lessons, of which that is one."

Aiden Porte​

 

[Aiden Porte]

Efret Farr​

Aiden did not interrupt her. He kept his pace slow, his body angled so she could read his face, and his presence in the Force stayed calm and steady, like a hand offered without closing into a grip.

When Efret finished, he gave a small nod, accepting her truth without trying to sand it down into something easier. His expression softened, warm and earnest.

"I will not argue with what you have learned here," he said quietly, making sure she could see every word. "If this is something you must carry in your own way, I respect that."

He lifted his hands and signed with care.

But you are not alone.

Aiden glanced down the shore to where Lira's laughter drifted, then back to Efret, gentler still.

"I cannot take it from you," he continued, voice low, "but I can stay near you while you face it."

He signed again, slow and clear.

I am here. Whenever you need me.

 

[Efret Farr]

I am here. Whenever you need me.

Efret offered a small nod. "I'll remember that," she replied. "Thank you. For everything."

Another smile flickered over her face. "But enough about me. You feel troubled."

Aiden's presence in the Force was undoubtedly strong and steady even as something seemed to shift the foundation. It tremored almost imperceivably, but, at the same time, she was almost sure of it. She had felt it from the moment that they had begun their promenade down the lakeshore—a slight tingle, an inkling that something wasn't quite right—possibly before if it had gotten lost in the initial emotion of their reunion and introductions. The feeling was reminiscent of looking through a sheet that was only barely translucent and seeing what you thought to be the ghost of a shadow on the other side, but you couldn't be sure it it was there or if your mind was conspiring with your eyes to make up the color and the shape.

The only way to be absolutely sure was to peel back the sheet or, in this case, to ask. As an Empath, Efret intuited many things without mindfully prying into others' minds, but she often still felt bad about as much as she felt reflexively. Thus, she'd always ask for more, never try and take it.

"What bothers you?"

The question came along with a gentle expression and a feeling send out that Aiden didn't have to answer should he not want to. Efret didn't demand knowledge from the living. When she had been an archeologist, she hadn't demanded it from the dead either.

Aiden Porte​

 

[Aiden Porte]

Efret Farr​

Aiden's eyes lingered on the lake for a beat, as if the pale water might offer him a way to frame what he was about to admit. Then he looked back to Efret, making sure he had her attention, making sure she could read his expression and the careful shape of his words.

"I was helping a friend, Pal Veda, on Geonosis," Aiden explained. His tone stayed even, but there was a quiet weight beneath it. "He had lost his friend in the canyons and beyond. We searched for him, and we came across a dark artifact."

He slowed his pace slightly as he spoke, not out of hesitation, but out of respect for the subject. His hand drifted briefly to his chest, not a gesture of fear, but a reflexive acknowledgment of where the memory still sat inside him.

"It was strange," he continued, voice low. "And it was very strong with the dark side of the Force. The kind of thing that feels like it is watching you back."

Aiden's gaze lowered briefly, not in shame, but in the careful focus of someone choosing restraint. When his eyes rose again, there was no dramatics in them, only clarity.

"I used what power with the light I had to destroy it," he said. "So it would not lead anyone else to their deaths, or be able to corrupt anyone."

The wind shifted. The waterline hissed softly against stone. Aiden's expression tightened for the smallest moment, then eased again, as if he refused to let fear take up space where discipline belonged.

"Apparently whatever essence was inside has taken a liking to me," he added, and his voice stayed steady. "A piece of it, anyway."

He did not dress it up as prophecy or curse. He did not invite it to become bigger than it was. He simply stated it as a fact he intended to manage, the way he managed everything else in his life that threatened the people he cared about.

"That is the main problem with that," Aiden finished quietly, meeting Efret's eyes. "I can destroy an object. I can end a trail. But if something survived in me, then the danger is not what it might do to others someday. The danger is what it might try to do through me."

 

[Efret Farr]

Naming things gave them power.

It also diminished that same power, but often an increase happened first.

Just the mention of a Dark artifact unraveled her nerves. Her right temple pounded as if her infection was responding to his like a long-lost friend.

"I understand," she said with a gentle squeeze of her arm around his. The look in her eye was enveloping like the sunlight smiling down on them from above despite the heaviness of this conversation. Her aura brushed up against his, warm and welcoming like a blanket on a cold winter's night.

The line between understanding and pity was fine as a hair, but she didn't stray over it, staying firmly on the former's side.

Just how much she understood became clearer to him as she explained.

"I met a Darkside Elite years ago. I never learned his spoken name, but I gave him the name sign Angry Braid." She paused to close her eyes. They stayed so only a moment; that's all that was needed for the image of the terrible Evereni man to trace into the darkness of her eyelids. Striking blue eyes. Stark white skin and hair. Toweringly tall. Deep, self-inflicted lacerations in the shape of her name dripping blood onto the Great Temple's reflective marble floor.

She opened her eyes and continued. "Our first encounter was on Jedha. We fought. He had this steel dagger. Ceremonial. Carved with ur-Kittât runes. I couldn't see it well during the fight because I sent Nirrah away. I didn't want her to get hurt. But I dreamed about that dagger for weeks, months, after. It was so clear, and not just that, other images too. I couldn't even escape them when awake.

"I suspect we've seen similar things." She hadn't seen them for about a year but was sure that she condemned herself to the nightmare over again. Even still, she couldn't bring herself to care—not yet. There would be time later. Now was not the time to worry about herself. It was time to help Aiden and if this was what that meant, what it cost, she would gladly pay.

"I was cut with the dagger twice during our fight. The pain was more than physical. It was as if it replaced the blood I shed with Darkness." Her brow knit. It was still there like a reactivating virus. It would never cycle out of her body.

"So, I understand," she repeated, not that she thought as much in doubt, but she wanted to make sure that it wasn't. "I felt like I had become a weapon too." That same feeling she thought she had left behind was brewing again deep inside. "Not because I had done anything violent, but because I felt the potential brewing inside."

A quick pause equal parts stillness and silence elapsed. "It's important to realize that. I'm glad that I realized that." She smiled at him. "I'm glad that you realize that."

She wasn't content to leave her piece at that though.

"But I was too cautious with that knowledge. I pushed someone very important to me away to protect him, but it didn't protect him. He was always safe. He could have anchored me. I know that now."

Elias came into her mind's eye as Malva'ikh had. His eyes were striking too, but gold and in the way that inspired awe, not terror.

"I let the Darkside take something from me it had no right to." Granted, it itself hadn't cost her a relationship with Elias—her own actions had done that, but she wouldn't have even thought to act in the manner she had without its taint. She didn't want Aiden to suffer a similar misfortune.

"Take care that it doesn't steal anything that it can't without your permission."

Aiden Porte​

 

[Aiden Porte]

Efret Farr​

Aiden's expression softened the entire time she spoke, and by the end of it there was a quiet ache in his eyes that only came from hearing the truth of someone he cared about. He did not rush in with answers. He let her words settle, let the weight of what she had lived and learned stand on its own.

Then he turned a little more toward her as they walked, his face warm and gentle.

"Thank you," Aiden said softly, and there was real feeling in it. "Thank you for sharing that with me."

He gave her arm a small, reassuring squeeze, careful and steady. "I know that was not easy to say." His voice stayed low, kind, and sincere. "But I am glad you did."

Aiden's gaze flicked toward the lake, then back to her, and a sweet, affectionate smile touched his mouth. He slowed half a step, keeping their pace easy and unhurried. "I will remember what you said," he added. "And I will be careful not to let fear make choices for me."

The warmth in his eyes deepened, steady as his promise.

"You are not alone, Efret," Aiden said quietly. "And I am grateful you trusted me enough to remind me how to stay myself."

 

[Efret Farr]

"Of course," she replied, the very edges of her smile weighed down with the reality of which they spoke. "You're not alone either. I need time away from Jedi orders, but I'll always help you."

The gentle warmth radiating from Efret's Force presence—though there was a shadow looming, cast by her own brush with Darkness—implied that she made the offer freely of any sense of obligation. And she did.

In truth, she still felt the pull of duty, the need to affiliate with one organization or another. It had such a strong gravity; almost impossible to deny, but Efret had somehow managed to walk away from it. That didn't spare her the urge to look longingly back on her history of service to the NJO and thus the GA, for she couldn't help but do that with some regularity.

Was this in some small, or not so small, way how a recovering addict felt? Pining for what they've left behind though they knew it not to be good for them?

While neither faction had been bad for the galaxy, they had in the last years of her career proved themselves to be bad for her.

She had found something that was good for her here, or rather had found the peace in which to do it: training convorees in visual telepath to see for the Blind.

Her focus wouldn't stray from that purpose but she could, and would, fit personal friendships and favors around it. Aiden was undoubtedly among those who she would still keep close even in her hermitage.

"If you need me, come to this lake and think of me. I'll feel it." She was describing clairsentience rather than telepathy: a feeling that someone was thinking about her stopping short of what they were thinking.

Aiden Porte​

 

[Aiden Porte]

Efret Farr
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"If you need me, come to this lake and think of me. I'll feel it."

"Thank you Efret." Aiden said with a smile as he placed his arm around her, giving her a gentle squeeze. The laughter coming from Lira on the shore as he chuckled himself.

"I'm glad we found each other today." The Jedi spoke as they shared a sight along the shore, one that resembled hope and light.

Thread End
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