Private Naboo: After the Ashes

[Luca Ioneşti]

Ee'everwest Summer Home
Lake Country, Naboo

So this was the place, huh?

A very large part of him had his mind made up about what such picturesque edifices meant. It wasn't to say that he couldn't appreciate the beauty, for there was beauty aplenty to be taken in, but the higher echelons of society were oft-painted with one brush, harsh strokes that imprinted decisive memories in his mind, but... seeing the obituaries, and following the curious thread that those brought up took a pickaxe to the ice wall that was his preconceptions. A dent, faint cracks of questioning his own beliefs, just a little, that wouldn't cause systemic collapse of the whole structure, but stood in defiance of its existence. The way it was all written painted the Ee'everwests as more than just looking as exception, but living and breathing it.

He wasn't certain he could trust it, but trusting it wasn't what he was here for, and the low anxious current of setting those preconceptions aside made him itch. He wouldn't even be here, intruding on what was ultimately a stranger's grief, if he hadn't been asked for, if his student hadn't sought his guidance, but it was in the most difficult times that people sought an anchor, so as not to float away. He, as a conduit of the Force, was well-equipped to do just that, as master to student, even if he was not in a position to do anything else for her; his concern over his still-new padawan gnawed at him that he could do nothing until she sent for him, as to assume otherwise would be improper. Even as a common man, he was instilled with these values. That was the way of the snows.

As such, fiddling with a credit chip in one hand - flipping it between his fingers to keep them occupied - he knocked with three moderate raps on the door with the other, and waited in clean, pressed, smoke-free, climate-appropriate robes, for an answer.

Teyla Sal-Soren

 

[Alora Ee'everwest]

She'd never been so alone with her thoughts.

Staying strong for what remained of her family was what carried them through, but their father's counsel was what she craved the most, and this lead her to pouring over the collection of his private journals that made their way to the summer home as they were completed. She had never touched them before now, learning at a very young age to respect his privacy, a time that was when he was not much younger than she was at this moment... but they belonged to her now. Belonged to all of them. A window into the soul that she would have remained too respecting of him to crack open, if not for Sera's insistence that Jagen would have wanted her to, to understand what made him who he was, outside of the lens of taking in his direct guidance for all the thirty-odd years of her life.

She was only beginning to learn what that meant, and pulling out each new (to her) journal lead her to lean on faith and pray with a depth she hadn't done since she was a child, before cracking the cover. It was at the tail end of one of these prayers that the triple knock came, and when the last of the words were mouthed in the barest whisper, her hands curled away from their fond perch on the cover, and she lifted her head to look in the direction of the study door, a half-second's wondering at who it could be drawing her gaze to the clock on the adjacent wall, which was slowing down, needing to be wound again. One of many old things that lived here.

Alora let out a long breath, and pushed the chair back, rising gingerly as if recent times had aged her a thousand years - life was a wearying thing, for now - and she swept around the desk, and out the study door to see who it was, tugging the modest, tan-coloured summer cardigan around her frame, slightly thinned by days of grief, restlessness, and general lack of appetite. Low heels tapped on the floor as she moved, coming to the door, and opening it.

"Oh! Master Ionești," she blinked surprise at seeing him there, until the memory that Teyla had asked for him came to the fore, "Teyla is just..." she glanced over her shoulder, "...why don't you come in? I'll go let her know you're here..."

She hesitated, then turning back to him fully.

"...but I feel I should make you aware..." she paused, hesitating in this, too, for reasons of propriety, "...Teyla... I'm... worried about her."

She didn't divulge further - again, respecting another's privacy, heading off any investigation he might start with a mild command:

"Wait here."

A wan smile was given to the Jedi, then she turned and went to fetch her sister.

-------------------------------------------------------------

Moments later, at the door to Teyla's room....

Again she hesitated, standing at the door, fist hovering to knock. Alora blew out a long, low breath, and let her knuckles fall against the door, in two staccato raps.

"Teyla?"

She tried to listen for anything, any clue as to her sister's current disposition, before continuing on.

"Master Ionești is here, waiting in the entryway..." again, listening, concern building in her mind, "...Teyla?"

Alora pursed her lips.

Maybe she's sleeping again....

And was about to round up for another knock when the door cracked open...

Teyla Sal-Soren