Pirate Prince
This is a short story which was originally written as part of the coronation of Queen Svana of Naboo. It was posted in three parts under an account which now hosts a different character. I am reposting it here for ease of reading, as it serves as a prelude to the events of this thread.
POV: Bithia
Current Configuration: Maternal Form
Wearing: A white shirt and black pants, but stylish
Tags: OPEN
When Bithia had suggested the family take a vacation on Naboo, she hadn't expected they would be there during not only a major festival, but the coronation of a new monarch. Traffic was absolutely horrible, the airways congested with visitors from countless worlds and dignitaries whose entourages blocked off entire highways. She felt less like a guest and more like an intruder on someone else's party.
At least Miri was enjoying herself. The eight year old had ice cream and was content to sit and eat it. Her mother, now lacking in taste buds, could only watch in envy, remembering the taste of the cold dessert as a distant memory.
Nimdok had gone into an antique store. Bithia and Miri sat on a bench outside, since food wasn't allowed inside. It was a warm summer evening, the atmosphere rather humid, almost stifling. Bithia sighed. She needed to talk to Nimdok about something important, but she wasn't sure how to broach the subject. Not when they were supposed to be celebrating.
Then there was Miri. She didn't even want to think about explaining this to Miri. Maybe she wouldn't have to, if things went according to plan…
Once Miri finished her ice cream, an eager Bithia threw the empty cup away and herded the child into the shop.
A dozen old clocks ticked in the first room by the entrance, painted faces and glowing visages counting down the seconds, minutes, and hours. So the visitor to this antique shop began in a chamber of time—clever. Beyond it, a dozen rooms stretched forward, silhouettes of a variety of different objects sketched in the dim lighting. Bithia imagined it smelled like most antique shops—faintly musty, but in a pleasant way. It would be the scent of aging wood and yellowed paper, rusted metal and decaying electronics. How she wished she could experience it.
“You can look, but don’t touch anything,” she told Miri. “It’s like you’re in a museum. You don’t want to break stuff.” Nodding, the girl wandered off to explore.
Bithia walked deeper into the shop, entering a room stacked with shelves of ancient books, datacrons, and various other means of preserving knowledge. A spiral staircase led up; she could hear voices above. She climbed the steps.
She emerged in a well-lit area full of locked cases displaying old jewelry and other fragile valuables. The voices, one of them unmistakably Nimdok’s, were conversing in the next room. She lingered a while, perusing the contents of the display cases and eavesdropping.
“How old would you say it is?” Nimdok asked.
“I’m no psychometrist. Your guess is as good as mine.” The other voice was that of an elderly woman, raspy and withered with age. “Look at these markings. Do you recognize the language?”
“No, but then I’m not a linguist.” There was a pause. “I suppose it could be an obscure planetary dialect. Do you have a record of who sold it to you?”
“Some no-name wandering adventurer. He said he’d bought it from some trader, who bought it from someone, who bought it from someone. Impossible to trace.” Another pause. “Would you… like to open it?”
“Not now, and certainly not here,” Nimdok replied. “These things can be quite dangerous, especially if you have no idea what might be inside. I would be interested in studying it, however. Is it for sale?”
“Hmm, maybe on loan. But not for mere credits. I have no use for money.”
“Really? You must be very fortunate.”
“Business is doing rather well.”
Bithia’s brow furrowed. Her psychology programming was picking up on qualities in the old woman’s vocal tones and word choice which indicated she was preparing for deception. It was so subtle, however, that Nimdok would have no clue he was being tricked. As she slowly approached the threshold, peering through, Bithia saw a little old Keshiri lady and Nimdok sitting across from each other at a small round table, at the center of which lay… a holocron. It was pyramid-shaped, engraved with strange runes, and the crystal lattice was an obvious Sith Red™.
“Well, what would you prefer as payment?” Nimdok asked.
The old woman adjusted her glasses. “Hmm, how about your soul?”
Nimdok blinked in surprise, then let out a nervous chuckle. “That’s one I haven’t heard before. What would you need my soul for?”
"A loan, of course. If you fail to return this in time, I'll come to collect..."
Before the old woman could say another word, Bithia crossed the threshold and entered the room. “I see you’ve managed to get yourself into trouble again,” she remarked, glaring at Nimdok with her hands on her hips.
“Bithia?” He sighed in relief. “Er, how long have you been standing there?”
“Long enough.” She reached forward and snatched the holocron off the table. “I’m absolutely astonished that you still haven’t gotten it through your head how dangerous these things are.”
“I wasn’t going to—”
“I don’t believe you,” she snapped. “I know how you are. Reckless, impatient, selfish—and a proven thief. Were you going to dupe this poor woman into giving you something valuable for nothing in return?”
Nimdok stared at her, one eyebrow raised, wondering what she was trying to accomplish. Meanwhile, the little old lady stood up from her chair, wringing her hands fretfully. “Please, oh please, put it down. It’s fragile, priceless! If you drop it, oh, I don’t know what I’ll do...”
Bithia turned to her, conducting a quick scan. Everything seemed normal, except… a very noticeable lack of higher brain functions. Such readings were found only in the sleeping and the comatose. “Fine. I’ll put it down—but somewhere out of his reach.”
“Give it to me, please.” The old woman held out her hands beseechingly. Bithia started to pass the holocron over to her… then dropped it.
“Bithia!” Nimdok yelped, though he quickly changed his tune after the old woman let out an unearthly shriek and dove down to catch it before it collided with the hardwood floor.
“I’m so sorry!” Bithia said, playacting a perfect imitation of guilt and remorse as she crouched down beside the old woman. One hand slid into her pocket, her fist closing around a tiny plastic spray bottle. “Here, let me help you...”
She took the bottle out of her pocket and quickly spritzed the old woman’s throat. The hag let out a wail, then gasped for breath, her body convulsing violently.
Nimdok practically fell out of his chair trying to get away from the resulting smell. “A little more warning would’ve been nice!” he exclaimed, covering his nose and mouth with his arm even as he backed out of the room. Bithia took the holocron from the old woman’s slackened grip, waiting for the shakes to pass and the exorcism to finish.
A substance like black smoke seeped out of the old woman’s pores, gathering as dark fog in the air. It took on the shape of a humanoid figure, vaguely feminine in shape, with two glowing white disks in place of eyes. It shuddered once, staring down at the host body it had just been forced out of, then whirled around to face Bithia. There was a moment’s pause as it attempted to vent its rage telepathically, but Bithia’s Force-voiding body blocked it so thoroughly, the Shadow could only seethe in silence. At least, until it opened a portal and slipped away to the safety of its native Netherworld.
With the Shadow gone, Bithia tended to the old woman. Her age-hooded eyelids fluttered as she came out of the trance she’d been put in. “Oh, I… my head…” She touched her brow. “What’s happened? What’s going on?”
“It’s all right, m’am,” Bithia reassured her. “You tripped and fell. Here.” She helped the woman up and into her chair. “Aside from your head, are you in pain anywhere else?”
“My arm—feels like I slammed it on something hard.” She touched her elbow where it had collided with the floor as the Shadow forced her to catch the falling holocron. As Bithia examined the limb, the old woman wrinkled her nose. “What is that smell?” With her free hand, she plucked at the collar of her shirt, sniffing. “It smells like a candy I used to eat when I was a little girl… How strange. I don’t own any perfume like that.”
Smiling, Bithia set the spray bottle on the table. “It’s called Chthonic.”
“Well, I like it. But… why did you spray it on me?”
“You asked me to.”
The old woman looked puzzled, then shrugged, accepting this answer.
Nimdok slowly peered in from around the corner, holding his shirt over his nose and mouth. Bithia turned to him and laughed. “Sorry I didn’t warn you. I just knew I had to act fast.” At the old woman’s questioning glance, she added, “To catch the holocron, I mean.”
“Is that what happened?” the old woman queried.
“Yes. I accidentally knocked it off the table, and you, Ms…”
“Winsworth,” Nimdok supplied, his voice muffled by his clothes.
“Ms. Winsworth, you jumped up to catch it, lost your footing and fell.” She turned to the holocron. “Speaking of which, we were looking to buy this device from you.”
“Oh, that old trinket? I’ll give it to you for… hm, three hundred?”
“Two hundred,” Nimdok bartered. Bithia shot him a glare. “Two hundred fifty.”
Ms. Winsworth shrugged. “That sounds reasonable. Unless you suppose it’s worth more than that?”
“Considering that nobody seems to know where it came from, likely not,” Nimdok said. “I am a historian, and I’m mainly interested in it for its historical value. There’s some strange unidentifiable writing along the edges which I mean to have deciphered by a linguist—”
“You don’t need to convince me, young man,” Ms. Winsworth said. “Any chance I get to rid myself of all this crap is one I’ll take. Only, would you mind calling a doctor for me first? I feel a little light-headed, and if that fall was worse than it looks...”
After paying for the holocron and calling a doctor, Nimdok, Bithia, and Miri left the shop and headed down the busy street outside. Nimdok, no longer shielding his face, was grinning from ear to ear.
“What’s so funny?” Bithia snapped. “It looked to me like you would’ve sold your soul to some freaky shadow demon thing in exchange for a Sith artifact if I hadn’t come in to stop you.”
“Oh, I wouldn’t say that,” he replied. “Maybe Arimanes would’ve sold his soul, but not me.”
“Arimanes,” she muttered. “Who was the one talking in there? Was it Arimanes or Errik? Who the hell am I talking to now?”
His smile faded. “Bithia, we’ve been over this before. It’s… more complicated than just one person interacting with the world at a time.”
“If that’s the case, then both of you might as well be dead.”
Nimdok stopped walking. “Maybe you’re right. Maybe we are dead.”
She turned around to face him. “All right, then. Nothing has changed. I should take Miri home to Alderaan and continue as if nothing ever happened.”
He stared at her. No words passed between them, but the look alone said everything. Miri stood between them, looking up at either of her parents’ faces with a furrowed brow.
“Don’t act like it isn’t the right thing to do,” Bithia continued. “You know she would be safer with me. This arrangement between us, with me flying around the galaxy with you while you put yourself in danger—”
“I said I wouldn’t have let anything happen back there,” he interrupted. “I meant it.”
“You shouldn’t have been in a situation like that to begin with. Not with Miri around.” She threw her hands in the air. “You know what? Forget it. This isn’t working.”
“What exactly do you want?” he pressed. “Do you want me to just hand Miri over to you? I’d rarely ever see her if you took her back to Alderaan. We agreed to this arrangement so that we could both be with her.”
“I want my life back!” she exclaimed. Her cry was loud enough that several onlookers having dinner at a nearby café turned to stare.
“You want things to be the way they were?” he muttered. Rather than getting loud, his voice lowered to a growl as he grew more indignant. “You want me to be the way I was, and you to be the way you were. I get it, Bithia. I want that too, a lot. But it’s impossible. I’m sorry.”
“You’ve said that already. Multiple times.” Unable to weep, Bithia contented herself with crossing her arms over her chest and looking miserable. “It’s not your fault, anyway. Not… you as you are now, at least.”
Nimdok pinched the bridge of his nose between two fingers. “Let’s just get home.” He looked around. “Where are we, anyway?”
“I don’t know. Let me check.” A local map appeared before her eyes, showing the route back to their ship. The traffic had gotten even worse as the coronation began.
“Where is Miri?”
At the panic creeping into his voice, Bithia’s head jerked, the map disappearing from her field of vision. “She was right here,” she said, turning all the way around as she scanned the thickening crowds. They were standing by one of Naboo’s many rustic bridges, this one arching over a waterway. A set of stone stairs led down to the water’s edge, a bank of yellow sand lapped at by small waves. Nimdok was already running down the steps.
“You’ve got to be fething kidding me,” she muttered, following him. “Of all the days she could’ve gone missing, it’s today…” Ahead of her, Nimdok nearly stumbled, caught himself, then sprinted along the water’s edge. He seemed to know where he was going. She followed, soon overtaking him in speed.
They found Miri further upriver, standing in bare feet and wet pants. She was shivering. Her socks and shoes lay in a pile nearby. Bithia was the first to reach her, questions leaving her mouth, while Nimdok scooped the girl up, carrying her away from the water’s edge.
“I was just playing,” Miri protested, afraid she would get in trouble. “It’s hot outside but the water is cold. I thought it would be warmer.”
“Miri, why did you leave without telling us where you were going?” Bithia asked. “We didn’t know where you were. You scared us.”
“You were arguing,” the girl replied, as though it explained everything. In a way, it did.
Bithia retrieved the socks and shoes and followed Nimdok, still carrying Miri, to the steps, where they set the girl down and let her put them back on. Silence fell between them, broken only by Bithia asking, “How did you know where she was?”
Nimdok sat beside Miri. He raised his head from his hands before replying, “We have a connection.”
“What do you mean? Like a Force bond?”
“No, it’s… familiarity more than anything else.” His eyelids lowered. “I can sense where she is, how she feels, and what she’s thinking much more easily than with other people. It works both ways—we can even communicate telepathically. I never told you about it, because I was afraid you would see it as unfair. Like I had some special connection to Miri that you could never have.”
“I’m getting used to things being unfair,” she muttered. Taking a moment to glance at the map again, she suppressed a groan of frustration. “The way things are right now, it would take us hours to get home. We’re better off waiting for all the coronation buzz to die down.”
POV: Bithia
Current Configuration: Maternal Form
Wearing: A white shirt and black pants, but stylish
Tags: OPEN
When Bithia had suggested the family take a vacation on Naboo, she hadn't expected they would be there during not only a major festival, but the coronation of a new monarch. Traffic was absolutely horrible, the airways congested with visitors from countless worlds and dignitaries whose entourages blocked off entire highways. She felt less like a guest and more like an intruder on someone else's party.
At least Miri was enjoying herself. The eight year old had ice cream and was content to sit and eat it. Her mother, now lacking in taste buds, could only watch in envy, remembering the taste of the cold dessert as a distant memory.
Nimdok had gone into an antique store. Bithia and Miri sat on a bench outside, since food wasn't allowed inside. It was a warm summer evening, the atmosphere rather humid, almost stifling. Bithia sighed. She needed to talk to Nimdok about something important, but she wasn't sure how to broach the subject. Not when they were supposed to be celebrating.
Then there was Miri. She didn't even want to think about explaining this to Miri. Maybe she wouldn't have to, if things went according to plan…
Once Miri finished her ice cream, an eager Bithia threw the empty cup away and herded the child into the shop.
A dozen old clocks ticked in the first room by the entrance, painted faces and glowing visages counting down the seconds, minutes, and hours. So the visitor to this antique shop began in a chamber of time—clever. Beyond it, a dozen rooms stretched forward, silhouettes of a variety of different objects sketched in the dim lighting. Bithia imagined it smelled like most antique shops—faintly musty, but in a pleasant way. It would be the scent of aging wood and yellowed paper, rusted metal and decaying electronics. How she wished she could experience it.
“You can look, but don’t touch anything,” she told Miri. “It’s like you’re in a museum. You don’t want to break stuff.” Nodding, the girl wandered off to explore.
Bithia walked deeper into the shop, entering a room stacked with shelves of ancient books, datacrons, and various other means of preserving knowledge. A spiral staircase led up; she could hear voices above. She climbed the steps.
She emerged in a well-lit area full of locked cases displaying old jewelry and other fragile valuables. The voices, one of them unmistakably Nimdok’s, were conversing in the next room. She lingered a while, perusing the contents of the display cases and eavesdropping.
“How old would you say it is?” Nimdok asked.
“I’m no psychometrist. Your guess is as good as mine.” The other voice was that of an elderly woman, raspy and withered with age. “Look at these markings. Do you recognize the language?”
“No, but then I’m not a linguist.” There was a pause. “I suppose it could be an obscure planetary dialect. Do you have a record of who sold it to you?”
“Some no-name wandering adventurer. He said he’d bought it from some trader, who bought it from someone, who bought it from someone. Impossible to trace.” Another pause. “Would you… like to open it?”
“Not now, and certainly not here,” Nimdok replied. “These things can be quite dangerous, especially if you have no idea what might be inside. I would be interested in studying it, however. Is it for sale?”
“Hmm, maybe on loan. But not for mere credits. I have no use for money.”
“Really? You must be very fortunate.”
“Business is doing rather well.”
Bithia’s brow furrowed. Her psychology programming was picking up on qualities in the old woman’s vocal tones and word choice which indicated she was preparing for deception. It was so subtle, however, that Nimdok would have no clue he was being tricked. As she slowly approached the threshold, peering through, Bithia saw a little old Keshiri lady and Nimdok sitting across from each other at a small round table, at the center of which lay… a holocron. It was pyramid-shaped, engraved with strange runes, and the crystal lattice was an obvious Sith Red™.
“Well, what would you prefer as payment?” Nimdok asked.
The old woman adjusted her glasses. “Hmm, how about your soul?”
Nimdok blinked in surprise, then let out a nervous chuckle. “That’s one I haven’t heard before. What would you need my soul for?”
"A loan, of course. If you fail to return this in time, I'll come to collect..."
Before the old woman could say another word, Bithia crossed the threshold and entered the room. “I see you’ve managed to get yourself into trouble again,” she remarked, glaring at Nimdok with her hands on her hips.
“Bithia?” He sighed in relief. “Er, how long have you been standing there?”
“Long enough.” She reached forward and snatched the holocron off the table. “I’m absolutely astonished that you still haven’t gotten it through your head how dangerous these things are.”
“I wasn’t going to—”
“I don’t believe you,” she snapped. “I know how you are. Reckless, impatient, selfish—and a proven thief. Were you going to dupe this poor woman into giving you something valuable for nothing in return?”
Nimdok stared at her, one eyebrow raised, wondering what she was trying to accomplish. Meanwhile, the little old lady stood up from her chair, wringing her hands fretfully. “Please, oh please, put it down. It’s fragile, priceless! If you drop it, oh, I don’t know what I’ll do...”
Bithia turned to her, conducting a quick scan. Everything seemed normal, except… a very noticeable lack of higher brain functions. Such readings were found only in the sleeping and the comatose. “Fine. I’ll put it down—but somewhere out of his reach.”
“Give it to me, please.” The old woman held out her hands beseechingly. Bithia started to pass the holocron over to her… then dropped it.
“Bithia!” Nimdok yelped, though he quickly changed his tune after the old woman let out an unearthly shriek and dove down to catch it before it collided with the hardwood floor.
“I’m so sorry!” Bithia said, playacting a perfect imitation of guilt and remorse as she crouched down beside the old woman. One hand slid into her pocket, her fist closing around a tiny plastic spray bottle. “Here, let me help you...”
She took the bottle out of her pocket and quickly spritzed the old woman’s throat. The hag let out a wail, then gasped for breath, her body convulsing violently.
Nimdok practically fell out of his chair trying to get away from the resulting smell. “A little more warning would’ve been nice!” he exclaimed, covering his nose and mouth with his arm even as he backed out of the room. Bithia took the holocron from the old woman’s slackened grip, waiting for the shakes to pass and the exorcism to finish.
A substance like black smoke seeped out of the old woman’s pores, gathering as dark fog in the air. It took on the shape of a humanoid figure, vaguely feminine in shape, with two glowing white disks in place of eyes. It shuddered once, staring down at the host body it had just been forced out of, then whirled around to face Bithia. There was a moment’s pause as it attempted to vent its rage telepathically, but Bithia’s Force-voiding body blocked it so thoroughly, the Shadow could only seethe in silence. At least, until it opened a portal and slipped away to the safety of its native Netherworld.
With the Shadow gone, Bithia tended to the old woman. Her age-hooded eyelids fluttered as she came out of the trance she’d been put in. “Oh, I… my head…” She touched her brow. “What’s happened? What’s going on?”
“It’s all right, m’am,” Bithia reassured her. “You tripped and fell. Here.” She helped the woman up and into her chair. “Aside from your head, are you in pain anywhere else?”
“My arm—feels like I slammed it on something hard.” She touched her elbow where it had collided with the floor as the Shadow forced her to catch the falling holocron. As Bithia examined the limb, the old woman wrinkled her nose. “What is that smell?” With her free hand, she plucked at the collar of her shirt, sniffing. “It smells like a candy I used to eat when I was a little girl… How strange. I don’t own any perfume like that.”
Smiling, Bithia set the spray bottle on the table. “It’s called Chthonic.”
“Well, I like it. But… why did you spray it on me?”
“You asked me to.”
The old woman looked puzzled, then shrugged, accepting this answer.
Nimdok slowly peered in from around the corner, holding his shirt over his nose and mouth. Bithia turned to him and laughed. “Sorry I didn’t warn you. I just knew I had to act fast.” At the old woman’s questioning glance, she added, “To catch the holocron, I mean.”
“Is that what happened?” the old woman queried.
“Yes. I accidentally knocked it off the table, and you, Ms…”
“Winsworth,” Nimdok supplied, his voice muffled by his clothes.
“Ms. Winsworth, you jumped up to catch it, lost your footing and fell.” She turned to the holocron. “Speaking of which, we were looking to buy this device from you.”
“Oh, that old trinket? I’ll give it to you for… hm, three hundred?”
“Two hundred,” Nimdok bartered. Bithia shot him a glare. “Two hundred fifty.”
Ms. Winsworth shrugged. “That sounds reasonable. Unless you suppose it’s worth more than that?”
“Considering that nobody seems to know where it came from, likely not,” Nimdok said. “I am a historian, and I’m mainly interested in it for its historical value. There’s some strange unidentifiable writing along the edges which I mean to have deciphered by a linguist—”
“You don’t need to convince me, young man,” Ms. Winsworth said. “Any chance I get to rid myself of all this crap is one I’ll take. Only, would you mind calling a doctor for me first? I feel a little light-headed, and if that fall was worse than it looks...”
After paying for the holocron and calling a doctor, Nimdok, Bithia, and Miri left the shop and headed down the busy street outside. Nimdok, no longer shielding his face, was grinning from ear to ear.
“What’s so funny?” Bithia snapped. “It looked to me like you would’ve sold your soul to some freaky shadow demon thing in exchange for a Sith artifact if I hadn’t come in to stop you.”
“Oh, I wouldn’t say that,” he replied. “Maybe Arimanes would’ve sold his soul, but not me.”
“Arimanes,” she muttered. “Who was the one talking in there? Was it Arimanes or Errik? Who the hell am I talking to now?”
His smile faded. “Bithia, we’ve been over this before. It’s… more complicated than just one person interacting with the world at a time.”
“If that’s the case, then both of you might as well be dead.”
Nimdok stopped walking. “Maybe you’re right. Maybe we are dead.”
She turned around to face him. “All right, then. Nothing has changed. I should take Miri home to Alderaan and continue as if nothing ever happened.”
He stared at her. No words passed between them, but the look alone said everything. Miri stood between them, looking up at either of her parents’ faces with a furrowed brow.
“Don’t act like it isn’t the right thing to do,” Bithia continued. “You know she would be safer with me. This arrangement between us, with me flying around the galaxy with you while you put yourself in danger—”
“I said I wouldn’t have let anything happen back there,” he interrupted. “I meant it.”
“You shouldn’t have been in a situation like that to begin with. Not with Miri around.” She threw her hands in the air. “You know what? Forget it. This isn’t working.”
“What exactly do you want?” he pressed. “Do you want me to just hand Miri over to you? I’d rarely ever see her if you took her back to Alderaan. We agreed to this arrangement so that we could both be with her.”
“I want my life back!” she exclaimed. Her cry was loud enough that several onlookers having dinner at a nearby café turned to stare.
“You want things to be the way they were?” he muttered. Rather than getting loud, his voice lowered to a growl as he grew more indignant. “You want me to be the way I was, and you to be the way you were. I get it, Bithia. I want that too, a lot. But it’s impossible. I’m sorry.”
“You’ve said that already. Multiple times.” Unable to weep, Bithia contented herself with crossing her arms over her chest and looking miserable. “It’s not your fault, anyway. Not… you as you are now, at least.”
Nimdok pinched the bridge of his nose between two fingers. “Let’s just get home.” He looked around. “Where are we, anyway?”
“I don’t know. Let me check.” A local map appeared before her eyes, showing the route back to their ship. The traffic had gotten even worse as the coronation began.
“Where is Miri?”
At the panic creeping into his voice, Bithia’s head jerked, the map disappearing from her field of vision. “She was right here,” she said, turning all the way around as she scanned the thickening crowds. They were standing by one of Naboo’s many rustic bridges, this one arching over a waterway. A set of stone stairs led down to the water’s edge, a bank of yellow sand lapped at by small waves. Nimdok was already running down the steps.
“You’ve got to be fething kidding me,” she muttered, following him. “Of all the days she could’ve gone missing, it’s today…” Ahead of her, Nimdok nearly stumbled, caught himself, then sprinted along the water’s edge. He seemed to know where he was going. She followed, soon overtaking him in speed.
They found Miri further upriver, standing in bare feet and wet pants. She was shivering. Her socks and shoes lay in a pile nearby. Bithia was the first to reach her, questions leaving her mouth, while Nimdok scooped the girl up, carrying her away from the water’s edge.
“I was just playing,” Miri protested, afraid she would get in trouble. “It’s hot outside but the water is cold. I thought it would be warmer.”
“Miri, why did you leave without telling us where you were going?” Bithia asked. “We didn’t know where you were. You scared us.”
“You were arguing,” the girl replied, as though it explained everything. In a way, it did.
Bithia retrieved the socks and shoes and followed Nimdok, still carrying Miri, to the steps, where they set the girl down and let her put them back on. Silence fell between them, broken only by Bithia asking, “How did you know where she was?”
Nimdok sat beside Miri. He raised his head from his hands before replying, “We have a connection.”
“What do you mean? Like a Force bond?”
“No, it’s… familiarity more than anything else.” His eyelids lowered. “I can sense where she is, how she feels, and what she’s thinking much more easily than with other people. It works both ways—we can even communicate telepathically. I never told you about it, because I was afraid you would see it as unfair. Like I had some special connection to Miri that you could never have.”
“I’m getting used to things being unfair,” she muttered. Taking a moment to glance at the map again, she suppressed a groan of frustration. “The way things are right now, it would take us hours to get home. We’re better off waiting for all the coronation buzz to die down.”
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