Archive of Our Own ^beta

She was tired, something deeper than bone-deep, and her limbs felt like they’d been weighted wrong when they’d been made, like saber hilts. But if she, who could draw from the Force and turn her pain into power, was tired, Quinn was exhausted.

She shook his shoulder gently, and he woke up with a start, moving ready for action, but she reassured him with gentle eyes and a finger to her lips; a headshake that everything was alright. He closed his eyes again, and went right back to sleep. She scooped him up like those propaganda holos of ridiculous, weak Republic brides, his knees tucked over her forearm, and carried him to their bed.

When she’d laid him gently on the covers, she stood up again to pull his boots off. Then she sank down onto the bed beside him in a slow motion, shucking off her shoulder-pads and gloves and her own boots as she did.

When Quinn woke, she was lying with her head on his chest. Her mouth was open, and a tiny dribble of liquid had made its way onto his tunic. Her headband was askew. One hand moved softly through her curls as he adjusted it, then didn’t leave them. She was snoring softly, and he observed this in awe; her hands and face were twitching to unconsciously seek him. It was like something a child would do. He’d never seen her this vulnerable. Quinn should have recoiled from this, from the image of a Sith Lord lying asleep atop him, not like a sexual conquest but like someone to be trusted – and a Sith Lord could trust no-one – but he felt himself smile instead.

When she woke, one of his hands was resting on her hair. The other was holding hers. Not her wrist, to restrain her, and not her torso, to savour her, but her hand. Like she was someone he was safe with.

In her heart, she whispered something that she had never said before.

When Quinn woke the second time, she was holding his hand, and looking at him like there was something new there, something that she was being gentle with so as not to injure. “Good morning, m’lord,” he mumbled, and something flickered across her face, then was gone.

She smiled at him, a small smile, but not the one with red lights for eyes or the one with teeth there to kill. It was the small smile she had when she wasn’t showing off for anyone, and something made her happy.

She sat up, leaving a gap between them so that he could sit up as well, could begin his morning routine. As much as he cherished his early hours, something in him felt a sense of loss, something he knew he shouldn’t feel. He knew he shouldn’t feel a lot of things, but the knowledge did not prevent the emotion.

She tapped his wrist, and he paused from putting on his boots to give all his attention to her.  She searched through her datapad, and pointed to the file she wanted him to look at.  It was entitled Statistics.  Quinn had sent her many statistics, but he knew instinctively, instantly, the ones she meant: the statistics around the partners of Sith (their partners' life expectancies; the lengths of the relationships;). This wouldn’t be his death sentence, he knew, not this morning – perhaps one moment of many that inched towards a fall from grace, but it seemed in this moment to be hers, killed in the brutal way that the Sith had, rather than his. She wasn’t angry with him, either; she couldn’t hide her anger well.

He found his voice. “I stand by what I said,” he responded; “I have no regrets for choosing this.” He placed one hand over his chest at the word ‘this,’ not reaching out to touch her – but he knew that she understood his meaning: this is my heart, this is my heart I gave to you as I became your property. This is my heart that you ordered me to take back, and make my own decisions with.

She pointed to her chest, in an I, then trailed to a stop. A wisp of her silken black hair wafted, despite the lack of breeze, from its place against her ear to her chin. She picked up her datapad again, and changed the program to a word processor, typing something.  He waited for her, still not donning his other boot (– and he might, in another time, a later time, think to himself that the other shoe did, indeed, drop).  When she showed him the datapad, it said We will change that statistic.

‘We will change that’. Not ‘I will,’ not ‘I’ – ‘we’. Quinn put on his other boot. He was smiling, too, as she had been only brief minutes before him.

Yes, he whispered, in his heart, and he had never said this before, this is my heart, and it is mine, and I know what I want to do with it.