Private The Perils of Pride and Ignorance

[Briana Sal-Soren]

Days had passed since that disastrous council meeting, intentional in her decision of leaving the dust to settle, giving enough time for tempers to cool and the both of them the time to chew and reflect more thoroughly on what all was said, and what more still needed to be said aloud.

The battered bridges needed to be repaired and peace between them brokered — if not in perfect agreement, then in the least, some semblance of shared purpose; least the consequences of this dispute drag the entire Order into the siblings continual riptide and destroy what was being built before it had the chance to properly run.

And it was precisely that knowledge, that damning weight of responsibility, that forced Briana to swallow down the lingering sting of this latest betrayal, and her own sense of pride, to seek out her brother and ultimately make her way out to the Shore.

The late-afternoon sun cast golden streaks across the lake, the gentle breeze carrying the faint scent of wildflowers from the surrounding meadows while children's laughter spilled out of the main cottage, accompanied by an occasional squeal of delight.

Standing under a viny archway as she waited for Brandyn to appear, Briana understood, all at once, why he was so reluctant to throw himself behind the cause that'd taken root in her heart. Even she felt a pull, an urge to stand there in the gilded sunlight and forget the rest of the galaxy existed. Who wouldn't want to lose themselves in a place like this? Briana idly pondered, her gaze drifting to a tiny figure perched on the front porch, absorbed in drawing pictures with colored chalk. Her pigtails bounced as she hummed along, completely oblivious to anything else around her, unencumbered by politics or war. Unknowing of anything beyond the simple joys of a safe and warm afternoon. The sight made something in her chest, ache.

What might their lives have looked like, had they been allowed to be unencumbered? Spared the compounding pains of war, loss, and family betrayals?

She sighed and turned to face the wall, brushing off the thoughts of pointless 'what ifs'. No good ever came from dwelling on them; it only distracted focus from paths that needed walking now. The present demanded attention, not the ghosts of possibilities long past.

The sound of footsteps crunching on gravel, measured and deliberate, made Briana look up, straightening instinctively as Brandyn approached, offering a slight nod in greeting. "Thanks for meeting me," she said softly, a lack of any inflection in her tone. "I thought it was important that we talk."

TAG: Brandyn Sal-Soren

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[Brandyn Sal-Soren]

He had fallen into his work. Cybelle knew something was wrong, but she gave him room. Besides, she liked how tidy the flowerbeds were looking. Gardening was a far better way for Brandyn to take out his frustrations than options he had previously tried.

He knew that the moment would come that he would be called to talk to the Council, or Lorn would show up to try and patch things over. Perhaps Kahne would be sent. Briana might even try Lossa or Vision out if she was desperate enough. But he had to give his sister credit when he heard that she was coming to visit.

The day was winding down, and the children were avoiding going to bed. He would see to that soon though, or perhaps Gianna would be out to care for the delinquents soon. Either way, it was not his focus now. Briana was to have his full attention.

He had just come from the large, industrial looking portable worksheet that they had brought on site while something permanent could be built. Dinner was surely to be called soon, and he had begun the process of cleaning up. Though his hair was still dirty and sweaty with the days work, his hands and arms were clean save for some pesky dirt around his finger nails.

The sight that greeted Briana was one that was a Brandyn that dressed nothing like the pampered child of Nabooian aristocracy that he was. Instead, he wore simple brown work pants with grass stains on his knees, and a tan button up with his sleeves rolled up and a little water splashed on his cuffs.

He looked up at his sister while he brushed hands off. Despite the foreign attire, it was still the same eyes peering at her through the chin-length hair that hung from his head. "I feel like it is more you meeting me," he said, smirk only half forming in the left corner of his mouth, "a visit from the principal."

He lifted his hand in apology in order to silence any protest. He winced, ruing the missed opportunity at a sarcasm-free start.

"Cybelle and Gianna have enough food prepared for you," he said as an olive branch. He sincerely hoped this would go well enough that she would stay for a meal.

"But. Yes. We talk first. I am sorry for how I went about things, Bri," he said looking down. He kicked a stone aside, just as he might had done as a child, "sometimes I just don't know how to make you listen to me. You get so...Sal-Soren...about things. Maybe we need to change to mom's family name..."

| TAG: Briana Sal-Soren fyi, Cybelle Sal-Soren |

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[Briana Sal-Soren]

Briana wasn't sure what to expect from Brandyn when he finally rounded the corner, but seeing him looking like he'd taken a tumble through the grasses, with a look of...humility? Contrition? Wasn't it — the light quip he opened with, earning him an exasperated look.

She shoved her hands into the pockets of her trousers, head giving a mild shake at the mention of dinner. The days proceeding this conversation had kept Briana's stomach tied in several knots, knots she thought would have finally unraveled once they met properly, though even now, standing in front of him, they hadn't abated. Food, of any sort, sounded nothing less than nauseating.

"Nah... I don't really plan on staying for too long. There's still some things I need to take care of back at the Temple after this."

Watching Brandyn as he stared at the ground, nudging pebbles with the toe of his boot, Briana felt a strange sense of deja vu. His awkward apology, the half-hearted attempt to lift the mood—all of it was so familiar, all of it so very Brandyn... and all of it brought her back to their childhood, to the countless times they'd danced around their feelings with insults, jokes, or jabs, instead of honesty. They'd both changed a lot since then, and yet, in moments like this, it was painfully clear how much they were still very much the same people.

Older, but none the wiser — still struggling with the most basic skills of communication.

"You could just...holo me, you know? Tell me when I'm being an idiot." Briana tried to mirror his smirk with one of her own, but it didn't sit right. It flickered across her face and vanished just as quickly. She exhaled through her nose and let the moment sit in silence for a few beats.

"I'm sorry, Bran. For what I said during the Council meeting. I never should've brought up the past like that."

Her teeth found her lip, worrying it as the breadth of her own words and what she wanted to say, what she needed to say, made her restless. She'd never been very good at apologies, or admitting when she was wrong. "I didn't see it—not until after you walked out. After Lorn left. That I'd gone too far. I want so badly for someone to answer for what happened to Romi, to Zeriana, to Aiden, Blaire... Astor..." Her voice caught for a moment. "I still think there is something to the vision we were shown, but... I also know I'm not in the right state of mind to discern it. I've been so focused on wanting justice, that I stopped trying to listen. Stopped trying to understand any of you." Briana pulled her hands out from her pockets and folded her arms across her chest as a makeshift replacement for the armor she wasn't wearing. "Tell me, honestly... do you think I can do this job, Brandyn? Do you really think... that I'm becoming him?"

TAG: Brandyn Sal-Soren


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[Brandyn Sal-Soren]

Brandyn didn’t answer right away.

Instead, he let the silence stretch, his gaze lingering not on Briana but on the path between them, as though the right words might appear carved into the dust. Her apology had landed—more than that, it had knocked something loose in him. A pressure behind his ribs, a heaviness he hadn’t even realized he’d been holding.

At last, he looked up.

“You remember the time we ran away from the estate,” he said, a quiet edge of nostalgia shaping his voice, “because Blaire dared us to catch a swamp lizard and bring it back in a tea tin for her prank?”

He smiled, faintly. “We got lost. You were crying—so mad at me, blaming me for everything. And I was trying to be brave. Said I knew the way. Said it a hundred times.”

His fingers curled at his sides, grounding himself in the memory.

“We stumbled back hours later covered in mud, empty-handed, and you had a skinned knee and I’d torn up my good shoes. Mom was furious. Blaire thought it was hilarious. But you remember what Dad said?”

Brandyn’s gaze lifted to hers fully now, steady, certain. It took a lot to remember his dad as anything more than the monster he was revealed to be later on. There was some good that bubbled to the surface occasionally. For some reason, speaking these words to comfort Briana made them easier to say.

“He said, ‘You were trying to lead each other, and that’s always harder than following someone else. But I saw something brave in both of you today.’”

He took a slow step closer. Not closing the gap completely—just enough to let the warmth between them carry the rest.

“You’re not becoming him, and it was wrong of me to say you were,” Brandyn said softly. “You’re becoming you. And that’s a person worth following.”

He hesitated.

“I know we won’t always see things the same way. And there’ll be times I push back, maybe even need some space. But that doesn’t mean I’ve stopped believing in you. I couldn’t. Just… promise you won’t ignore me when I get that unsettled...instinctual...feeling again?”

His eyes flicked toward the porch, where the soft chalk drawings had spread farther across the wood.

“And for what it’s worth… I’m really glad you came.” Brandyn sat next to his sister finally. His forehead leaned against the side of her head. He briefly contemplated asking what shampoo she was using, but thought better of it.

"Please stay for dinner."

| TAG: Briana Sal-Soren |

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[Briana Sal-Soren]

Briana stayed quiet, listening to Brandyn. Her brother had always had this way about him, this ability to take the most complicated things and distill them down to their simplest truths. Sometimes it drove her crazy. Other times, like now, it worked to disarm her.

"I remember," she said softly, the corner of her lips ticking up at the edge. They'd been filthy, sunburned, and absolutely lost. She remembered how her once pristine boots squelched through the mud until the leather buckled. How blistered her feet became, how she'd screamed at Brandyn for getting them turned around, swore she'd never let him lead the way again while clutching onto his hand like a lifeline as the sky darkened —because being lost with him, was better than being lost alone. Then there was coming home. Briana remembered them finally staggering into the entry hall like war veterans with twigs in their hair, remembered the look on her mothers face and their father lifting her up without a word, wiping mud from her cheek, and calling them both brave.

Not clever. Not obedient. Brave.

That memory had dulled over the years, sanded smooth by grief, guilt, and all of the time and effort she'd spent trying to sever the parts of herself that resembled him — the man once hailed as Naboo's wisest mind, who'd advised queens, who'd spoken with clarity and conviction in the Great Rotunda, before all of the lies and betrayals found him, before it all rotted from the inside out. Afraid, that, if she let herself remember the good parts, she'd be justifying the bad. But, Brandyn had placed that memory back in her hands again and she felt its weight, its light. Like an old, precious heirloom, plucked from a locked drawer, worth dusting off.

Her arms came loose at her sides, no longer folded, no longer braced. It was strange how something so simple could feel so profound. How much she needed to hear it, even if she hadn't known she needed it. "I used to practice his speeches in the mirror when no one was watching, you know? Wanted to make people listen the way he did." Her voice dipped into something fragile, unguarded. "When the truth came out and we lost them, I hated myself for ever admiring him."

She looked up at her brother. Looked through him. "You could have chosen a different memory to throw at me," she said. "Could've picked any one of the times I failed, any time I pushed too hard, or didn't listen. And I would've deserved it." A faint smile curled at the corner of her mouth. "But you didn't. You reminded me that we've been lost before, and we still found our way back. Not because we had all the answers, but because someone took the lead, and someone else trusted them enough to follow—grumbling the whole way, maybe, but still."

She paused, letting the words hang for a moment. "I don't want to drag anyone along behind me—not you, not the Order or the Council, not anyone. I want to walk beside you. All of you. And if that means letting you lead when I can't see the way forward, or letting someone else... then I will. Even when it's hard. Even when everything in me is screaming to act. And when it's me who sees something clearly, even if no one else does… I hope you'll listen, too."

Her eyes closed as his head came to rest gently against hers. And for the first time in what felt like forever, the weight in her chest lifted. Briana exhaled—quiet, unburdened—and simply breathed. A beat passed before adding gently, "Yeah… I'll stay."

TAG: Brandyn Sal-Soren

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