Starcrossed: A Star Wars Fanfiction

Don't Leave Me

Detainment.

Why did that word seem to be following her around everywhere?

Granted, it was not the first time she'd been unexpectedly and crudely detained by a Jedi. 

Only back then, they called it "protection for her own good". 

But that was only half of the truth.

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"Are you telling me that you've been inviting that Jedi here in secret for the last 7 years!" Thane Constellan growled at Queen Nephelie, abruptly shattering what Eris thought had been a leisurely stroll with her parents through the queen's magick herb garden. 

Eris's ears perked up at the word Jedi, finally distracted from her silently ongoing duel of lightsabers--ahem, Irontree sticks--with Nebula Starcreth. As she and her handmaiden couldn't resist behaving the way children ought to be children behind the stiff and commanding shoulders of her parents, the Royal Majesties. 

"I had no other choice," she answered calmly, as she proceeded walking, forcing him to keep following her. "Eris was almost kidnapped as a baby, right under your guards' watch. I know my sisters in the coven were behind it. And still, you refuse to protect her. What else was I supposed to do to look after my child?"

"Better that she were dead than sell me out to the Republic!" Thane declared. "Do you realize what might happen if that Jedi found out about my negotiations on Zekus?"

"There's no reason for you to be concerned. The Jedi and I have an understanding with each other. Any fault he finds with Jeotis, he is to come through me first, not the Republic or the Jedi Council," she said. "His only duty here is to protect the crowned princess."

"And why should I trust you now?" Thane demanded. "What is the nature of this 'understanding' you seem to have with this outsider? If you kept this secret from me for 7 years, why tell me about it now?"

"Jedi Master Jinn has recently taken on a new apprentice and can no longer visit the outer rim as often as he used to," she said. "So, we came up with a new plan to protect Eris."

"We?" Thane side-eyed her critically. "As in you and the Jedi?"

"Eris will have a Jedi youngling as her playmate," Nephelie informed him. 

"Over my carbonite corpse!"

"It's already been decided."

"By your Jedi?" Thane demanded, forcing her to stop and face him again. "There are no political ties binding him to protect her. So, what interest does this one Jedi have in the princess anyway, I ask you?"

"You know very well what."

"If that were the case," Thane refuted. "Then he would have killed her with his own lightsaber by now. Why is he protecting her? You can't tell me it's out of the goodness of his heart. What other deals have you made with him behind my back?"

"Mother," Eris was desperate to interrupt her parents' heated argument. "Is that really true? Is Jedi Jinn really never coming back to Jeotis anymore?"

Nephelie avoided meeting her daughter's eyes, as she glared back into the king's. 

But it wasn't the familiar hellish scorch of anger that Eris felt resonating in her mother's energy. 

It was a feeling far deeper and more crushing that Eris couldn't really name at such a young age. 

As if Eris weren't the only one gutted by the sudden news of Master Jinn's forever departure.  

"We can discuss this later," Nephelie informed her husband. "I have guests to greet."