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amiedala · 1 year

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SOMETHING DEEPER

CHAPTER 27: Something Deeper

WARNINGS: explicit sexual content, power play

SUMMARY:

“Hi,” Nova whispers, holding the weight of the world in that one, desperate confession.

“Hi,” Din echoes, and everything else fades out.

This, right here? This is something deeper. This is the best kind of karma. This is coming home.

AUTHOR'S NOTE:

IT'S ME, BACK FROM THE DEAD, WITH A 13,000+ WORD WHAMMY OF A FINAL CHAPTER!!!

this is where i apologize, for the infinite time, for promising to be more consistent and then consequently dropping off the face of the planet. 2022 has, quite literally, tried to kill me. please take this final installment of Something Deeper as much of an apology as i can muster. i'll go into more depth at the end, as always, but for now, please know that i waited this long to put this finale out until it was as polished and perfect as it could get. i hope you love this final chapter, and while the word "soon" might not mean anything coming from me anymore, i promise Something Holy, the final book in the Something More Series, is already being written. it will be yours soon. thank you, from the bottom of my heart, for sticking with me, Nova, and Din until the very end. it means more than i can say. <3

In the morning, Nova wakes up first.

The sunlight, streaming in through the windows, is the polar opposite of Mandalore. There, everything is blue—muted, cool, soothing even in its holocene. Here, the warmth seeps in through the curtains before the sun even rises, the sky already pink and toned and gorgeous. Both mornings offer different things—steadfastness versus serenity—and yet, both planets feel like home.

For the first time in what feels like an entire lifetime, Nova doesn’t have a nightmare. No Sparmau. No blue lightning. No Ezra, desperate and lost in another mortal plain. No visions of her parents’ ship being dragged out of the sky. No ominous, creeping warning that the First Order–or the looming villainous nothingness—is coming. Just dreamless, restful sleep.

When she wakes up, it’s slow. The pink light streaming in through the windows is the first thing she notices, the way it warms the floorboards and spills over the mess of their bedding. The off-white comforter is turned orange by the glow. The second thing she notices is the way her body aches, familiar bruises swelling over the map of it. But Nova grins with the hurt of it all, marveling at the way Din’s fingerprints are embedded in her thighs, over the grasp of her hips, pressed into her throat. It’s familiar and nostalgic—it’s been so long that the bruises that line her body were from love instead of war.

The third thing she notices is Din.

His mouth is parted slightly, the pink light of Naator cresting over the rugged contours of his face. It slopes over his nose, and Nova resists running her finger over the bump in it. She doesn’t want to wake him from his sleep. He looks peaceful, rested.

“I love you,” she whispers into the open air, barely making a sound. “I love you so much.” He doesn’t stir, just takes in a quiet inhale. Nova stares at him in his sleep, memorizing every single atom that makes him up. At the beginning of all of this, before she knew Din as Din, she wanted him. A gravitational pull anchored her to his side, the Mandalorian who intrigued her. His depth, his kindness—they were shown in small doses, through the cracks in his armor, both literally and figuratively. The way he refused to leave her behind on Corellia. The way he protected her when Xi’an came back to the ship. The way he chased her down when her heart told her to flee. And now—now, even when she betrayed him, even when she ran after promising she never would again, here he is, tangled in her arms, ready to marry her all over again.

Nova can’t help it. Her eyes well with tears.

Din stirs under her watchful eye, and Nova bites her lip, trying to swat the tears away. His eyelashes flutter open, and when they come to rest on hers, there’s nothing but love. And then, immediately after, concern. She swipes one away with her fingernail, but Din catches her wrist midair.

“Novalise,” he says, slowly, carefully, “did I hurt you?”

Nova swallows, stroking the line of his jaw with the hand he isn’t holding captive. “No,” she whispers. “No. I’m just being emotional.”

His eyebrows furrow, his eyes sharpen. Din for you’re lying.

“I’m not lying,” she protests. “I’m not hurt. I promise. I just…I can’t believe we’re here. I’m so happy that we’re here. After all this…it feels like a dream.”

At that, he softens. “I know.” Silently, Din pulls Nova against his chest, and she crumples against the safety of it. For a few minutes, neither of them speak. Din traces shaky but certain circles across Nova’s bare back. “You did…so well evading me.”

Nova pulls away, grinning up at him. “I told you I’d give you a fair fight, Mandalorian.”

Din cracks a genuine, rare smile. “You did,” he says, shifting against her to face her head-on. “I…I believed you, you know. I was just trying to rile you up. I knew you could the whole time. I didn’t doubt you.”

Nova squints. “You doubted me a little.”

Din sighs. “I’m an expert,” he murmurs, dropping his lips to his collarbone. “Hunting bounties was all I ever did before I met you.”

Nova hums, leaning into his touch. “Did you ever fuck your bounties?”

Din stops, pulling away. “No,” he says, immediately. “Only you.”

Nova smiles, biting down on her bottom lip. “I know,” she whispers, lazily running a hand through his hair. “I remember what you told me, the first time you kissed me, back on Dantooine. You didn’t really do anything before you met me.”

Din nods, his eyes on her lips. “Nothing of consequence. Nothing that mattered.”

Nova meets his gaze, giving him a gentle smile. “I know.” The repeated assurance hangs between them. “Next time you catch me,” she breathes, her eyes roaming from Din’s to his mouth, “you should handcuff me.”

She can feel him harden against her leg. “Were my hands not good enough?” In response, one slides up to bracket her neck. “Do you need more of a reminder?”

He squeezes down, just enough for the edges of Nova’s vision to bottom out, and she gasps into the open air. “A reminder,” she stutters out, “of what?”

Din shifts, pinning her legs under his, and once again, Nova feels like divine prey. “You know what, cyar’ika,” he breathes into her open mouth, “that was the last time you’re ever running from me.”

Nova sighs as he straddles her. “Who said anything,” she manages, meeting his sharpened, lustful eyes, “about running?”

The sky has bled through violet to magenta to salmon to pale pink by the time Din and Nova eat and get outside. The door, thrown open last night, never got closed, so when they walk out into the open air, they’ve spent the morning already breathing it in. Nova steps over the vestibule to the sky, so gorgeous that even the highest level paints couldn’t capture it correctly. The morning, there’s a hint of fall in the air, a chill that persists even with the sun high in the sky.

It’s perfect. Naator, in all its beauty, is perfect. Being here, after everything they’ve endured is perfect.

She feels Din come up behind her before she sees him. The smell of leather and gunsmoke and metal and earth and something more than all of them. Cinnamon, ever-present, even though the spice doesn’t even exist on most of the planets they’ve journeyed to since. It still smells like home. She turns, slowly, reveling in it. He’s back in the beskar, covered in reflective silver. His helmet, though, is trapped against his hip and his hand.

Nova beams. Din smiles back. “You’re out in the open,” she breathes. He did the same thing on Sorgan. He’s shown his face to everyone that he considers family, now. But this is different. This isn’t in grief, or in a controlled space. It swells in Nova’s throat.

“Until we reach town,” Din confirms, pulling her into his armored body, slinging an arm around her jacketed shoulders. They walk, in unison, around the bend in the little clearing their cottage is dropped in, through the crunch of the yellow leaves that keep dancing down to the ground.

Nova savors everything around her—the feeling of the leaves beneath her boot, the air singing with honeysuckle and soil, the mild pink skies above the gaps in the trees. Naator feels sacred, like something holy. To her, it is. Untouched, a relic. So far away from the war and violence that’s seemed to follow them all around over the last year. She’s determined to keep it that way. Nova’s jaw clenches with the unspoken promise.

“What?” Din murmurs, low enough that it just resounds next to the shell of her ear.

Nova swallows. “I…while we’re here, I want to pretend. Pretend that the First Order isn’t lurking in the darkness. Pretend that Ben doesn’t turn evil. Pretend that Ezra is safe, or that he’s just a dream.” She bites down on her bottom lip. “Pretend that war isn’t coming,” she whispers, quieter. “But—”

“But,” Din interrupts, not unkindly, “that’s not how you work, Novalise. That’s…not who you are.”

Nova nods. “Exactly.”

Din regards her carefully. “Do you remember what it was like?” He asks, and then echoes, “before?”

Nova blinks a few times, coming to a standstill. The leaves drop wistfully to the ground around them, but the trees never become bare. It’s like they replenish every time one falls. The woods around her aren’t silent, but they seem to hold their breath as she stops. “When the Empire won?”

Din nods.

“I couldn’t forget even if I wanted to,” Nova whispers. It’s the full truth. “I wasn’t alive when they came into power, but I know…I remember how dark everything was. Uncertain. Horrible.”

“The First Order doesn’t seem as…”

“Obvious?” Nova cuts in.

“That’s not what I was going to say,” Din muses, “but yes, actually.”

Nova sighs, rubbing her eyes. Even though she had her first night of restless sleep for the first time in what feels like years, she’s suddenly exhausted. “I think…I think they’re in their infancy,” she says carefully. “I know when all of this started, when you became Mand’alor, that we thought they were a more…present threat. I think the pieces that I know about—Gideon not being in charge of everyone, Sparmau’s connection to ‘him’ and the Dark Side, visions of Ben Solo as someone evil and unhinged—they’re all…futuristic, almost. Like maybe the First Order isn’t in existence yet. But I know they’re coming.” Nova punctuates it with a double-fingered tap across her heart. “I can feel it, Din, in here. But it’s not just the First Order ahead of us to fight. It can’t be. There’s a million restless pieces hidden behind the scenes, and the evil that they are might just be the tip of the iceberg.”

Din watches her, curious, awed. “Do you think…do you think that there’s anything to fight against? Right now?”

Nova chews on her bottom lip. “I mean, there are things to fight, after we get home. I don’t…I don’t know if they have a fleet of starships or that they’re ready to attack us. But I know there’s something wrong with Ben. I know the visions I’ve had will become real someday. I know that Qi’ra and the Crimson Dawn, whatever the hell they are, want political capital and to run spice through Mandalore.” She looks up at him. “I kind of wish they—whoever they are—had a fleet of starships ready to attack us, though.”

Din offers a small smile, and as always, it makes Nova’s heart flip over in her chest. “Something concrete,” he allows, hooking an arm around her shoulders, steadying them both. “I know what you mean. But…Nova, there’s no war here.”

And the weight doesn’t lift completely off of Nova’s shoulders, but it feels lighter, more tangible. Enough to push away the darkness. Enough to put in on pause.

The town is as serene as it was the last time they were there. Nova watches as Din pulls his helmet over his face, turning from man to Mandalorian. When they step out from behind the trees, it feels like something shifts. Nova’s hair is still a disaster from the night before, but no one gives her a second look after greeting both of them with a smile. Everything is glorious in the morning light, sifting through all the gorgeous yellow trees.

It moves at a sleepy pace, this town. It’s a comfort after spending so much time running for her life. Nova passes through the gauzy curtains fluttering in the light breeze, breathing in the scent of the leaves. Everything here feels safe, colored a perpetual state of goldenness.

“Are you hungry?”

“Hmm?’

Din gestures toward the restaurant in front of them. “Hungry?”

Nova’s eyes glitter. “You satiated that need already.”

Din cocks his helmet at her, and Nova laughs into the open air.

“No,” she concedes, swinging out in front of him to wrap both of her arms around his neck. “No, I’m not hungry. But I want to go somewhere. Come with me.”

Din doesn’t move until Nova’s hands slide down from where they’re clasped at the nape of his neck, gliding across the individual, seamless pieces of beskar, down until they grasp his gloved hand. He lets Nova pull him onward, through the idyllic little town, with no resistance, without any quarrel.

The little flock of trees where they stood once, preserved under the perennial, falling yellow leaves—it’s not distinct enough to stand out. But Nova remembers walking over the gnarled roots in the ground, the branches that curled up and over the others, like they’re dancing, trying to hang perfectly in the air. She weaves in and out of birch trees, small, flowered bushes, until both her and Din are back in the spot where they started. A lifetime ago, the first time they fell together on this planet, when it was love before the word.

Din observes, silently, from under the visor. When Nova turns around to study him, she catches herself in the tiniest blip, a singular supernova of deja vu. She inhales, breath shuttered in the valley of her throat, chewing on her bottom lip. Around them, the leaves dance down, a lulling melody in the gentle, sweet wind.

“You told me,” Nova says, in a whisper so quiet that Din has to lean in to hear her, “that I was your home once. In this very spot.”

He doesn’t move. Slowly, agonizingly, his hand snakes up across the fabric on her arm, up to the bare, exposed dip of her collarbone, anchoring finally against the back of her neck. Nova falls into his gravitational pull—the same way she did the first time, the same way she always has. “Novalise.”

“Listen,” she mouths, and Din falls silent, obedient, waiting. “You’ve been my home since I met you. Since I walked on the Razor Crest. Since you trusted me enough to let me in, but if I’m being honest…long before that.” She stops, trying to keep her voice steady. “But this is where I admitted it. This is where our lives, together, really started.”

Din nods, just once, the beautiful warmth of Naator reflected dully in his beskar.

Nova reaches up, hooking her fingers under the rim of the helmet. “Do you trust me?” she asks, and this, too, vaults her back in time.

“Yes.” The permission is there in his voice. Nova takes a sharp, solid inhale, and lifts it off. He’s staring at her, love in his eyes, half-lidded, star-studded. Like even in all of Naator’s gorgeousness, Novalise is the only thing in the entire galaxy. Nova’s heart catches in her chest, as it always does, as it always has.

“I love you so much,” she breathes, and then repeats it in Mando’a. Din echoes her, and as Nova watches his lips curve around the contours of the vowels, everything explodes.

Nova recoils, skittering backward as if she’s been struck, her head and her heart split open by lightning. She holds both her palms over her eyes, trying to shut it out—the immediate weight of it all, the heaviness of holding the world on her shoulders. All the peace that Naator usually offers suddenly dissipates, and doubt seeps in like fog, like poison, like venom. It holds her captive, whispering in her ears like a death rattle—Sparmau may be dead, but Nova put her in the ground. Blue lightning. Ezra trapped in an alternate dimension, one that may not even be real at all. The look of pure evil simmering in Ben Solo’s eyes. Something ocean blue and dangerous, lurking on the edges. The impact of her parents’ ship fracturing off into a million awful pieces. Cara’s death. The darkness coming in from every angle, shaving off every single piece of her until the only thing left is a weapon. The wound Jacterr carved into her stomach. The scars she wears every day. The look on Din’s face when she left—again—the resounding echo of I don’t forgive you.

“No!” Nova screams, and it reverberates through the trees. She has no idea how the chasm opened, but now that it’s been carved, she can’t escape it. She’s going to fall in. So she does the only thing she can—run.

Not alone, though. Never alone, not again. She reaches forward and snatches Din’s gloved hand, unsure if she’s able to manage any apology, pulling him behind her. Din stares at her, stunned. Nova can see it out of the corner of her eye. But panic comes up and threatens to swallow her whole, and despite all of her promises, she keeps running.

“Nova!”

“Follow me,” she cries, a choked, visceral sob. It’s too much. It’s not enough. She feels like a false idol, like she’s been masquerading. The love she feels, the love that she’s lost. Her home on Yavin. Her parents, killed by an enemy she wouldn’t meet until ten years later. The man she thought she loved, how his punches felt like knives. Giving up the Rebellion. Nearly losing her life in space. Cauterizing every single wound she’s ever had with a shimmering, vital blade. Trading happiness for disaster. Din walking away from her on Dantooine. Having to fake her death on Mandalore. Looking pure evil in the face and winning. Almost losing Din and Bo-Katan in the same stroke of horror. Every awful thing Grogu’s had to endure. Surviving and nearly falling over the edge. Not being forgiven. Looking in the mirror and seeing a split between Novalise and the saint and Andromeda. Past lives and lives yet to come. Ezra’s panicked face. Blue lightning. Horrible laughter. The certainty that darkness will rise again. The future, shimmering but uncertain. The longing for something more pounding inside of her chest, finally laid bare. Wanting to be holy, to live forever. Wanting a quiet life here, on Naator, with no more hurt ahead of her. This is what hurts the most—a glimpse at a future that still hangs uncertain. All of it collides, a horrible kaleidoscope.

“Novalise!” Din’s voice is unobscured now, sharp, sudden. Nova can hear it register, faintly, barely, over the incessant pound of blood in her ears. She runs across the flower field, up the barely trodden path towards the cave in the maw of the mountain, open and waiting for her. Neither of them are attempting to remain quiet this time, disrupting the forest’s peace. Nova can’t find it in her to care, to bring herself down to the earth. Her heart is still screaming. She’s following the sound, how it coaxes her toward the cave. Her name, a chant, three times.

“Novalise.”

This time, it isn’t just Din’s voice–it’s a triumvirate. Nova can feel it calling out to her, whispering through the sage, amber glow of the forest. She climbs, over and over again, until she’s standing at the cave’s open mouth. Din’s only a few steps behind her, but Nova hurtles through the opening. Like it’s making a choice. And Din follows, right on her heels, like she knew he would.

“Nova!”

She turns.

“I’ve had this dream,” she whispers, “over and over again. A vision, maybe. It’s me, looking in this mirror at the top of a dais. Almost like the throne room on Mandalore, but different. And I’m wearing this dress, Din, silver and shimmering, with this—halo on my head.” She swallows. “And I see her everywhere. This version of myself, this saint. I see Andromeda, too, her innocence, her determination, her brokenness. For months, it’s replayed on a loop in my head. I’ve been trapped in this alternate dimension with two timelines in opposing directions. It’s crazy. I know. I know how that sounds.” Nova steps toward him, reaching her hand out. A plea. “Come with me.”

Din stares at her, helmetless. His hair is a mess. His eyes flash with worry. “What?” A single word with such care, such concern. “Novalise—”

“I don’t know what it means,” she whispers, broken in half. “In every dream, either of them will tell me they’re—me. That I can’t throw it away. When I saw Ezra, he told me I can’t throw it away. None…none of it makes sense. They’re glimpses. Force visions are like that too, especially the ones Grogu makes me see, when he presses his head to my forehead. And I didn’t understand. I never understood. But,” she says, pulse racing, the realization that it’s the truth warming her belly from the inside, “I do now.”

Din just cocks his head at her. “What do you mean?”

Nova grabs onto his hand, which latches perfectly into hers. “I need to show you something.”

Din lets himself be led. He doesn’t argue that she said the same thing back down the mountain, that she’s not making sense. He trusts her—wholly, implicitly.

Nova carefully retraces her steps, following the trickling, shimmering stream to the center of the cave. On top of it, still impossibly, sits the dais with a mirror. Din’s breath catches in his throat, an impossible thing. Nova swallows, leading him closer, closer, closer. Slowly, carefully, she walks up the stone to the center of it. There’s barely enough room for the two of them on the same pedestal, but they make it work. Nova’s leg draped over Din’s, her foot notched against his boot to keep them in place.

“Do you trust me?” Her mouth is only a few inches away from his, her hair flowing in an invisible breeze into his face, tangled in his beard. Din swallows, eyes glancing off her lips, and then he nods. Resolute. Complete.

His answer is the same as it was before. The same as it always is. “Yes.”

Nova dips her chin, chewing on her lower lip. “It might be scary,” she whispers, just a breath, nothing more. “I’ve never—Grogu is the only one I’ve been able to do this with. Others have put visions in my head, but it’s only people who can use the Force.” She swallows. “But…the mirror. I think the mirror will help me show you.”

Din’s eyes flit across hers. “Nova,” he says, quietly, “I don’t understand.”

Nova huffs out a tiny laugh. “I know. I know you don’t. But you will.”

Din holds her gaze. “I trust you.” Unwavering.

Nova swallows. “I love you.” Absolute. She reaches up, snaking her right arm around so that it latches onto Din’s temple. She matches the placement on her other hand, the other side of his head. A tether, a lifeline. Slowly, she turns his head to face the mirror. “Open your eyes.”

He does, but only in theory. They’re still closed, but Nova can feel them moving, flickering, tracking. She appears in the mirror, the saintlike version of herself. Her face is impeccable, a portrait. A world crackles to life within her gaze. The image flickers. It’s her at fifteen, lips half-chewed and not nearly as pink as they are now. Her hair, shoulder-length and messy. That same gleam in her expression, her chin jutted upward, her eyes on the stars. The rest of it comes in flashes, two ends of the continuum. Her parents: Piper tall and statuesque, Arokel with his crooked smile. The way her mother’s hands match and create her own. The flicker of her father’s eyebrow, his constellations charted across her nose. The smell of springtime on Yavin. Seeing space for the first time behind the pilot’s seat. Flying Kicker for the first time Din’s breathing through the modulator. Flying in the Crest. Swimming in a sea so blue it hurts to look at. The glittering of the stars above. The sound of a lightsaber igniting. The sharp cliff edges of Ahch-To. Landing on Naator for the first time. Din’s face, bare and unrestricted. Din down on one knee. Din on both knees, face between her legs. The hook in Din’s nose reflecting in the low light of the ship. Din leaving her on Dantooine. Din finding her again in the double suns on Tatooine. Din’s mouth on hers. Din’s warmth radiating across the void, bringing Nova back home. Din giving Nova her name all over again. To radiate. To shine in silence. Sparmau’s catlike gaze locked on hers, knives in Nova’s heart. Her blood full of poison. Her anger like venom. The vision of Piper and Arokel’s ship crashing down into nothing. Andromeda. Jacterr’s fist connecting with her jawbone. The scar he ripped up her stomach. Nova taking her first life—Jacterr, then her own, right after each other, in succession. Seeing Wedge again by chance, and letting him bring Andromeda back. Meeting Luke in person, even more magical than she ever could have dreamed. Leia’s lightsaber lighting up in tandem with her own. War on the horizon. Din, Din, always Din. Grogu’s tiny little hand pressed into hers. The crystal cave on Ilum. Boba and Fennec letting her hug them, embrace them. Cara’s knowing, sacrificial smile. Bringing Din back to life. Being ready to sacrifice herself over and over again, the martyr complex that somehow refuses to die. Meeting Sparmau as Andromeda back on Yavin. Sacrifice, eternal sacrifice. Her lightsaber hanging off her belt, the Darksaber in her hand. The feeling of karma, of justice, of triumph over evil. Din’s hand in hers, over and over again, making Novalise Nova. Saint. Andromeda. Novalise. Over and over again, Nova spills her lifeline over into lifetimes, showing Din every incredible, agonizing piece. Of who she was before. Of the woman she is now. And of the holiness she will be someday. Only with the vision of the two of them tied together on the cliff’s edge when he proposed does Nova let everything recede, fall back into place, and takes her hands off of Din.

It’s his choice, now, if he wants to give her his in return.

For what feels like an eternity, Nova doesn’t move. Doesn’t breathe. Doesn’t do anything, terrified that she’s broken some rule of what she can and cannot do, using the Force for something corrupting, something dangerous. Her heart hinges in her chest. In, out. In, out.

“Oh,” he breathes, and Nova doesn’t dare move. “Oh.”

She swallows. Din’s eyes fly open.

“You—” he cuts himself off, breathing heavily in the cathedral ceilings of the cave above them. Nova feels dizzy. “That’s what it’s like? Being in your head?”

It’s so gentle. Nova can feel the tears coming. “I—More and more now, it’s all the time. It’s every single waking moment, everything that’s brought me to this one. And everything that’s yet to come.”

Din stares.

“I know I’ve been a disaster,” Nova breathes. “I know I’ve made mistakes, Din, over and over again. But I’m trying to fix it. I’m going to fix it. I’m going to save us, and the galaxy. I don’t know how. But I know that I will.”

“I would say you’re just one person,” Din manages, slowly, carefully, “but—”

“But I’m not,” Nova admits, her teeth sinking into her bottom lip again. “And now you know it. You know it all.”

“When you left to fight Sparmau,” Din says, still tentatively, like he’s trying to fit it all together, “you really were doing it because you didn’t think you had another choice.”

Nova’s eyes well with tears. “Yes. I didn’t. And it’s not an excuse, Din. It’s not an excuse for running from you, or not giving you a chance to make the decision with me. But for as long as I can remember,” she stops, hitching in a shallow breath, “running has been the only way to keep me safe. To bring me home. You’re the only thing in ten years that has ever made me stop. And when I had the choice to stand my ground or to run to protect you, I ran. Muscle memory. Because it’s kept me alive. And it was my biggest mistake.” She swallows. “This time, when I ran up the mountain, I knew you’d follow me. And I knew I could show you this. Because this is what it’s like to be—”

“You,” Din manages, raggedy but strong. “You, Novalise. You.”

Nova swallows.

“I love you so much,” she whispers, a breath of a thing, moving as close as their tiny proximity will allow. “Darasuum. Forever. And I want to spend the rest of my life—this lifetime, last lifetime, and the next lifetime—with you. But, Din—” Nova’s breath catches, and she closes her eyes, trying to find the center, “—I don’t know if I can marry you in front of everyone—after all of this—without you forgiving me.”

He stares. She grabs his hand, holding it flat against her chest.

“I know…I know that might not be fair. I didn’t tell you I forgave you right away, either. And I know forgiveness is hard. I know betrayal is the worst wound. I felt it when you left me. But I need you to believe that I am never, ever going to run again. You loving me, it’s penance. It’s—it’s karma, in the best kind of way. And I understand if it’s going to take time. I don’t need your forgiveness right this second. But—”

“Novalise,” Din interrupts, and Nova stills. “I forgive you.”

Her heart wrenches upward. What a terrifying, magical thing. “Din, I just said—”

“I forgive you.”

Nova presses her lips together. “You mean it?”

Din nods. A vow. “I…I don’t know if I can live multiple lifetimes like you can. I will love you in this one, and I will try to carry it…into the next. But,” he says, tipping his forehead against hers, his gloved hand lacing in her hair, “don’t you dare ever leave me again.”

“Never again.” She’ll learn how to say it in Mando’a. She’ll say it in every language the stars know. But it’s the truth, regardless of what tongue it’s spoken in. So when Din presses his lips to hers, Nova feels forgiveness. This is the karma that led her here. And this, too, feels like coming home.

Three more days pass. In every one of them, Din shows Nova every single piece of the parts she thought she’d lost in the battle. They lay in the middle of the flower fields, mapping out the constellations, tracing the stars. They climb trees like children, laughing in midair. They fly Kicker around, across the ocean, up into the stars. Nova watches as Din learns how to pilot an X-Wing, grinning and giddy the entire time. They eat food in the village, and in the back booth, away from everyone else, Din eats, unarmored. In the evenings, in the mornings—their bodies find the same rhythm they’ve invented and reinvented, every moment a brilliant, shining star.

The night before the wedding, Nova falls asleep in Din’s arms. Above them, the night sky shines purple and pinpricked to let the light through. The cool, flowery breeze filters in through the open windows, letting the wind dance the curtains around and around—like they, too, have been swept off their feet.

“Thank you for bringing me back,” she mumbles, barely awake, and as Din��s hands stroke over her head, Nova doesn’t know what she means—bringing her back to Naator, bringing her back to her senses, or bringing her back to life.

He folds her in even tighter, and whispers I love you over enough times that those words, too, hold multitudes, a vow.

Bo-Katan crash-lands in the middle of the field the morning before their wedding. With a gleeful, unnatural smile on her face, she shoves Din out of his own house, stacking his arms high with Mandalorian blue colored clothes. The ship—Bo-Katan’s ship, Nova guesses—has been completely renovated. Its belly is gleaming silver and wide enough for Din to spend the entire day as the guests start arriving. Bo-Katan, however, gives him a strict order to not see Nova again until she’s walking down the aisle, and even though Din huffs off, Nova sees the glimmer in his brown eyes as he walks away, memorizing every inch of her until he gets to hold her again, scooping Grogu off the ground as he walks away.

“You’re excellent at literally everything else,” Nova says, as Din and Grogu walk off across the field to Bo-Katan’s awaiting gunship, “why can you not fly a ship to save your life?”

Bo-Katan fixes her with a withering icy glare. “We all have our flaws.”

Nova grins at her, pulling Bo-Katan and her full armor into a hug. “A year ago, you never would have admitted that.”

Frustrated, Bo-Katan pushes Nova away, up and over the vestibule, and manhandles her into a chair. In the mirror, Nova watches the light in her best friend’s eyes, hiding her small smile against the rogue curls that drift into her face. “A lot can change in a year, Novalise.”

Nova sighs, letting Bo-Katan brush through her hair, meeting her eyes in the mirror. “I know.”

“With us,” a voice from the doorway sighs, “a lot can change in twenty-four hours.”

Nova grins. Wedge, for practically the first time in his life, isn’t wearing his orange jumpsuit. He looks unfinished without it, mildly uncomfortable. He keeps running his hands over the hem on his jacket, like he’s increasingly aware he’s not supposed to be wearing it.

“Hey.” Bo-Katan snaps her fingers. “No men allowed.”

“That is not Naboo tradition,” Wedge says, ignoring Bo-Katan’s order and the sour look on her face. “Just the husband-to-be. I’m allowed to see the bride.”

“How would you know,” Bo-Katan grumbles, but she moves off towards the fresher to run the tub anyways, and Nova stands up and settles into the notch of Wedge’s arm.

“You look beautiful, kid.”

Nova raises her eyebrows. “I haven’t gotten ready, yet, Wedge.”

“Still,” he grins, pressing a peck to her temple. “You always are.”

Nova swallows. “I wish—”

“Me too.” She doesn’t need to finish the sentence for Wedge to understand. Today—and every day—the two of them feel the loss of Piper and Arokel. Out of the corner of her eye, Nova can see the grave, sad expression on Wedge’s face. Long ago were the days that it didn’t exist at all. For a second, Nova sees it in flashes—him carrying her around on his shoulders when he was a teenager and her parents weren’t much older, back when Nova was still Andromeda, back before this life existed at all. But she blinks, pulling away, and Wedge looks the same as he always has—the smile lines on his face are so much more prominent than the wrinkled ones. “They’d be so proud of you, Nova,” he whispers, and Nova lets herself sink into the sadness of it, the regret she has. “I am, too.”

Nova looks up at him. “It’s still weird,” she manages, sounding like a little kid again, “remembering they’re not here. Fighting this war without them. Especially with whatever comes next.”

A strange, pained expression flits across Wedge’s face, but it passes as quickly as it appears. Nova’s eyebrows furrow, but before she can ask, Bo-Katan reemerges without speaking and points one impeccable finger towards the doorway. “Later,” he says, and the double meaning isn’t lost, even as he disappears into the pink sunshine of the early afternoon.

The day fades off into a brilliant, shining salmon. Nova can feel the heat leaving as Bo-Katan sits her down, braiding white flowers into her long, curly hair.

“How’s Mandalore?”

Bo-Katan meets Nova’s eyes in the mirror, finishing the last strand of her hair. It’s beautiful—long ringlets cascading down her back, two strands framing her face, a braided crown across the base of her skull. Nova bites down on her bottom lip, raising her eyebrows in question. They’re perfectly even, except for the scar that cuts through her right one, a few shades lighter than the deep brown of her skin. Nova asked Bo-Katan if she should fill it in, and Bo-Katan had given her a very definitive no.

“Ready to have you back,” Bo-Katan says, her voice guarded. More so than it usually is, and Nova raises that unfinished eyebrow in question. Bo-Katan sighs. “Not thrilled about joining with Rebel forces, but rallying behind their Mand’alor.” She straightens up, shoulders back. “They’ll come around.”

“You’re so sure about it,” Nova says softly, and Bo-Katan nods, resolute. “How?”

“Because,” Bo-Katan answers, smoothing the silk collar of Nova’s robe over her shoulders, “Mandalore is a planet of warriors. And you’re the strongest of us all, leading us into whatever battle comes next. They might not love you, but they trust you. And respect you. And, besides,” Bo-Katan sighs, “War is always coming. That’s something you and all of Mandalore have in common.”

Still, there’s something weighted there, but Nova doesn’t push. There’s a whole lifetime of the next fight ahead of them. This moment—this is for love, for peace. For war to be laid bare.

“I’ll be right back,” Bo-Katan says, abruptly, and Nova smiles at her receding in the mirror. Only then does she look at herself head-on. Her face has been made up—not in armor, not in war paint—but in the same simple makeup that Piper Maluev once wore for her own wedding. Her lips are pink, her eyes are delicately lined in black. Nova feels Andromeda here in equal measure, glittering just like her parents are, alive in memory and in her. Arokel’s eyes, Piper’s beauty, Andromeda’s smile.

Nova stifles a sob. Bo-Katan walks through the curtain into the corner of their bedroom, alarm immediately catching on her face.

“What?” Bo-Katan asks, immediately, moving swiftly into position. “Did Din do something? I’ll punch him, would that help—”

Nova shakes her head, willing the tears to keep at bay. “You chased him out of here upon pain of death, Bo-Katan.” She swallows through shards of glass. “No. I…I just…I can’t believe my parents aren’t here.” She swallows. “I know Din and I are technically already married, and they weren’t at that either, but…this is a Naboo wedding. The kind my mom and dad had. And it just hit me that they’re gone. They’re never going to see me get married. They’ll never meet Din, or Grogu, or you, Bo-Katan.” She touches a hand to the beskar Rebel symbol hanging from her neck. “I’ve been running for so long,” she continues, quieter still, “that I forgot how much it hurts when I’m not.”

Bo-Katan doesn’t say anything. For a long time, she just stands there, at attention at Nova’s side. And maybe that’s enough, Nova thinks. Bo-Katan’s love language isn’t words, anyway, it’s action. The fact that she’s here, facing it all with Nova anyway—that’s enough. And then, with the stealth only a Mandalorian can possess, she turns around to one of the bags splayed over the bottom half of her bed. Silently, she unzips it, pulling something white and gorgeous out of it.

Nova watches, backward in the mirror. It’s not until she turns around that she understands what Bo-Katan brought her. “You made me a dress?”

“I,” Bo-Katan says, so carefully, “did not. It would look like armor if I did. But I helped. Creative direction. Whatever you want to call it. The stitching on the outside is silver.” She points at the gossamer thread that laces the gown together. It’s glorious. It’s long and flowing, with miniscule stars scattered all over the train. The sleeves are silky lace that catches Mandalorian blue when it hits the light. The top of it looks structured—like wisps of beskar—like it’ll fit Nova perfectly. It’s so beautiful. “Some of it is thread from Mandalore. But…not all of it.” She looks at Nova in a way Nova can’t quite decode.

“Where’s the rest from?”

Bo-Katan swallows. “You’re allowed to be mad.”

Nova startles. “Why would I be mad?”

“Because…I kind of…stole something.”

Nova raises her eyebrow.

“From you. Well, not you, really, but something that was—yours.”

“Bo-Katan. I have no idea what you mean.”

Bo-Katan sighs in frustration. “I went to Yavin. I went into the old base and found your family’s quarters. In the corner, there was a pile of bookbinding materials. In there…I found thick silver thread.” She clenches her jaw, looking uncomfortable. “It was your father’s. For his linguistic books. I wanted you to have something. Of his. For your wedding.”

Nova’s eyes go glassy. Her throat tightens even more, and this time, she can’t stifle a sob.

“Oh, Maker,” Bo-Katan says, dropping the bunch of fabric in her hands. “Nova, I’m sorry, I thought you’d like it, that you’d—I don’t know, feel like your parents were here with you—”

“You went to Yavin?” Nova manages. “You went to Yavin, for me?”

Bo-Katan stops, her shoulder sagging. “Of course I did,” she whispers. “You’re my best friend.”

Nova gingerly lifts the dress back onto the bed and then promptly launches herself into Bo-Katan’s arms. Well, against her armor, because Bo-Katan’s arms aren’t open. But slowly, as if she’s adjusting to the shock, they come up, closing around Nova’s back, patting her gently—if awkwardly—between the shoulder blades.

“I, uh,” Bo-Katan says, muffled against Nova’s thick, never-ending curls, “I have something else, too.”

Nova dislodges herself the best she can, wiping her eyes frantically with her fingers. “What else could you possibly have?”

Bo-Katan slowly reaches back into the bag, rustling around until she pulls it free. Nova watches it glitter in the low light before she can blink into focus. Immediately, she recognizes it. It’s the headpiece her mother wore in her own wedding. It’s the halo of stars that Nova wears in every vision of herself, saintlike and untouchable.

“Bo-Katan—”

“I put everything back,” her friend says quickly, cutting Nova off. “In the place it came from. The room looks undisturbed. I promise.”

“Thank you,” Nova says, in one breath of air. “Thank you so much. I don’t know how you found these things. I don’t–I don’t know where you even got the idea. But you…you don’t know how much this means to me.” She swallows. “I’ll have a piece of them there at the wedding, after all.”

Bo-Katan’s lip wobbles, and that’s enough for Nova to yank her back into a bone-crushing hug. “I know what it’s like to lose your family,” she whispers. “I wanted you to know that…you still have one.”

Nova swallows, her throat constricted. She’s trying very hard not to cry, to keep her makeup intact, to save the tears for the ceremony itself, but as usual, the tears threaten anyway. “I love you,” she manages, through all the emotion. “I know you don’t like gushy speeches of emotion, but I do, and you need to hear it. And…Bo-Katan, you’re my best friend. I had no idea when I first met you that you’d become this person for me. But I need you to know that I couldn’t do this, any of this, without you.” Nova’s hands glance off Bo-Katan’s cheeks, warm and full between her palms. It’s so different from the icy exterior that once seemed impenetrable. Up this close, Nova can see the light smattering of freckles stubbornly scattered across her nose. “You’re a good person, Bo-Katan of the clan Kryze. You’re the best kind of person. You’re the one I need in my corner. You’re the person I trust in a fight. And whatever’s coming for us next is going to be a hell of a fight.”

“I know you and Din are Mandalorians,” Bo-Katan says softly, “but I sincerely hope your wedding doesn’t turn into a fight, Novalise.”

Through her tears, Nova tips her head back and laughs. It’s blurry when Bo-Katan comes back into her line of sight. “You know what I mean.”

“I do.” Bo-Katan sobers, picking the dress back up. “But that’s not what’s important right now.”

Nova splays a hand over her heart. “Bo-Katan Kryze focusing on something other than an impending war? Say it isn’t so.”

“Shut up,” Bo-Katan says, but there’s no malice behind it. “Get dressed.”

And so Nova does.

The entire procession is gathered outside. Nova shivers in anticipation through the crack in her front door, looking at the magenta sunset hanging on the horizon. She swallows, catching a glint of light against the beskar, and her mouth runs dry. There, at the end of the aisle, decorated with yellow leaves and flower petals, is Din. Her husband already. The love of her life.

“Are you ready?”

Nova whirls around. As if in a trance, Bo-Katan reaches forward and straightens her veil, the starry crown encircling her head. Nova swallows. “It’s stupid to be nervous, right?”

Bo-Katan considers it. “You’re already married.”

“I am.”

“It’s Din standing at the end of the aisle. Not some…enemy.”

“Yes. Din.”

“Realistically speaking, walking down an aisle in front of all your friends is the least scary thing you’ve done in…months.”

“Realistically speaking, you’re right.”

“Well,” Bo-Katan says finally, “it may be stupid. But I think you’re allowed to be irrational. Just for today.”

“Right.” Nova exhales. “I’m still scared. Just, you know, for the record.”

“Well,” Bo-Katan says, simply. “I don’t know how you’re supposed to feel, so in my book, I suppose that’s fine.”

Nova chews on her bottom lip, stalling until her heartbeat runs back down to its normal beat. “Were you ever in love?”

Bo-Katan affixes her with a sour look. “I know you remember my dating history, Novalise.”

Despite everything, a laugh bubbles up in the back of Nova’s throat. “And you know mine. You can easily love someone who turns out to be a monster.”

Bo-Katan sobers. “Not like this,” she answers, softly, and Nova knows she’s laying everything bare. “Not the way you love Din. And certainly not the way he loves you.” It blooms in her chest like the honeysuckle and clover growing in Naator’s gorgeous fields. “When Sparmau took us to Coruscant, there were hours when he wouldn’t talk to me, you know.” Bo-Katan swallows. “He was furious at me, Nova, for letting you escape. For helping you go off to fight Sparmau on your own. If she didn’t kill us, I knew I could lose him anyway. Not because I kept your secret. But because he was willing to sacrifice everything to make sure you were the one who came out of it alive.”

“If she killed you, either of you—”

“I know.” Bo-Katan’s eyes flash in the low light. “I know, because I would have felt the same way, Nova.”

Nova tries to keep her composure.

“Sparmau left, once, after torturing us for hours.” Her voice is barely there. “My throat—it was swollen, almost shut. Din was beaten half to death. And he looked at me, helmetless, with that anger in his eyes, and I tried to tell him it would be okay, that you were coming, even if I didn’t know if she’d even let that happen.” Bo-Katan swallows. “And he looked at me with one good eye and said, ‘Nova’s job isn’t to save us. It’s to save the galaxy’.”

Nova stops breathing.

“And I tried to tell him he was being stupid. Because he was. As if you’d let us stay there. But he yanked me close with the chains keeping us knotted together and whispered, ‘But she’s going to save us anyway.’”

Tears well up in Nova’s eyes. “He did?”

Bo-Katan nods. “I told him some bullshit about how he couldn’t stop believing. I didn’t know where it came from. It was like you possessed me for a minute there, or something. He was still so mad, but he listened. And then he said, ‘Nova’s the only miracle I’ve ever believed in.’”

Nova exhales, a shaky, rattling thing. I don’t believe in miracles, but I believe in you. “Bo-Katan—”

“That man hasn’t known faith in the same ways you have. He doesn’t hold weight in higher powers like you and I do. But Din Djarin has looked a miracle in the eye every single day since he met you and knew that was something holy.” Bo-Katan steps forward, grabs Nova on the arms of her glittering, silver-white gown. “Whatever war we go into next, that man will be a zealot for you. He will defy every single person who tries to tell you no. You’ve brought him back from death more than once. I’m telling you this now because I need you to know that if you are scared walking down that aisle, you are an idiot.”

Nova startles. It brings her back down to earth, a lightning strike.

“Every single person standing out there would walk into battle with you. We have before. We will again. But the one at the end of the aisle, Novalise? He’s had a crisis of faith for the last two years. And you’re the only divine thing that’s pulled him out of it. He’s not afraid. He’s standing there, helmetless, in front of people that have somehow—” Bo-Katan punctuates this with a begrudging eye roll, “—become our family.” She stops, adjusting the starry crown atop Nova’s head. “He’s not scared of any of this. That’s a man who’s all in.”

Nova straightens her shoulders. “Thank you,” she whispers, the words wobbly. She wants to cry, to give Bo-Katan a sappy speech about how the only miracles she’s made happen are because of the faith people have in her, about how her best friend is something holy herself—but she reigns it in. Bo-Katan went out on a limb to give Nova these words. She owes it to Bo-Katan to give her sweet, meaningful silence. So she just squeezes down on Bo-Katan’s grip, letting her friend take one arm instead, fisting the curtain in the other hand, and gives her a nod.

She’s not afraid anymore. There’s a war ahead, sure. There always will be.

But this love burns so much brighter. It shines so much deeper.

The music starts to swell, stars pricking to life in the magenta dusk.

Nova’s sage eyes meet Din’s brown ones—emotion marrying warmth, over and over and over. Everything shimmers and sparkles. Something deep inside of her chest comes to life. Slowly, Nova and Bo-Katan make their way across the aisle, strewn with flower petals and yellow leaves. Around them, the people they love—Grogu, Luke, Leia, Wedge, Boba, Fennec—beam as Nova and Bo-Katan pass, but Nova doesn’t take her eyes off of Din’s, that beautiful, singular locus.

When his hands clasp around hers at the end of the aisle, everything in the universe shifts into place.

“Hi,” Nova whispers, holding the weight of the world in that one, desperate confession.

“Hi,” Din echoes, and everything else fades out.

This, right here? This is something deeper. This is the best kind of karma. This is coming home.

Bo-Katan moves around behind them, orbiting the two of them like a singular star. Only then does Nova look out at the small, mighty procession—the people gathered around them in a semicircle, strewn across flower petals and yellow leaves, the sky shining a deep, warm pink above them as the sun slips over the horizon. All of them, gathered here, putting their individual fights to bed, to share in this radiant, brilliant moment. It thunders in Nova’s veins, makes her heart grow three sizes.

“On Mandalore,” Bo-Katan begins, “weddings aren’t a ceremony. They’re simple, private events. Two Mandalorians remove their helmets and say their vows in Mando’a. Those are the kind of weddings I grew up with.” She looks at Nova, then over at Din. “But we’re not on Mandalore,” Bo-Katan continues, with a ghost of a smile spreading across her face, “and Nova and Din are something other than Mandalorians.”

Din narrows his eyes slightly. Nova grins.

“Love,” Bo-Katan says, rolling her shoulders back, “used to be a four letter word to me. The people I loved were my sister, and the most evil woman in the galaxy.” Nova meets Bo-Katan’s eyes, which glimmer with just a lapse of momentary grief. “Both of them are dead now, for better or for worse.” She swallows. “But love,” she continues, into the pink night, “is not. Not here. Not ever again. You know, Cara was supposed to do this part. She was supposed to stand up here in front of the entire crowd and perfectly proclaim why Novalise and Din are perfect for each other, why their love is so special, but Cara is dead now, too.”

Nova sneaks a furtive glance at Bo-Katan, raising her eyebrows. Bo-Katan shoots her back a chilling glare, perfectly clear—I know what I’m doing. Nova looks at Din, who imperceptibly shakes his head, a small smile splayed across his face, and Nova relaxes.

“I hated Nova when I first met her,” Bo-Katan says, and both Luke and Fennec laugh out loud.

“Bo-Katan,” Nova interjects, “seriously?”

“I hated Din more,” Bo-Katan continues, serene and unperturbed. Din presses his lips together as Bo-Katan tilts her head towards him, undeterred. “Really. I thought you were a zealot, and I thought Nova was too hopeful for her own good. I didn’t want to spend a second with either of you. I wanted Mandalore for myself.” She stops, looking up toward the three peaks in the distance. “I don’t want that anymore.”

Everyone settles back into silence.

“My whole life, I’ve judged people by the way they’re able to hold their own. Especially on the battlefield. And since I’ve known Nova and Din, there’s never been a second of peace. Both of them, in their own ways, have fought back. Back against tyranny, back against evil, and most of all, back against me.” She moves a half step closer. “Not with weapons, but with determination. Care. Anger, sometimes, sure. But most of all, with love. There’s been a hell of a fight since Nova and Din met me. And a fight even before that, when it was just Nova and Din against the galaxy. Before they brought us in on any of it.” She stops, and Nova catches her eye, and for the first time, Nova sees something that could be tears reflected back at her. “I once thought there was one way to be a Mandalorian. I didn’t think someone raised as a Child of the Watch could be a Mandalorian. I certainly didn’t think that a Rebel pilot—a Jedi, at that—could be a Mandalorian. But both of them have sat on that throne, and I’ve never wanted to fight alongside two Mandalorians more.”

“Nice save,” Din mutters, and Bo-Katan shoots him a death glare.

“To Novalise and Din, though,” Bo-Katan says, ignoring him entirely, “fighting isn’t a way of life. It’s to have a life, after the battle is done.” She stops, watching as a shooting star streaks across the sky. “The battle might be done, but this war isn’t,” Bo-Katan whispers, more to herself than to any of them, “but I know at the end of that one, too, the love that the two of them have will outlast all the fighting. The rest, though,” Bo-Katan says, “and everything in between, is up to them.”

Nova beams at her. Din smiles, too, and Nova can feel the eyes of the family they’ve chosen gleaming back at the three of them, the unlikely triumvirate, as Bo-Katan steps back.

“Neither of you are wearing helmets,” Bo-Katan says, “but—”

“I want to say the Mandalorian vows anyway,” Din interrupts, and Bo-Katan nods, pleased. He looks at Nova, and the entire galaxy shines back at her in those brown eyes, trained just on hers. “Repeat after me. Mhi solus tome, mhi solus dar’tome, mhi me’dinui an, mhi ba’juri verde.”

“Mhi solus tome, mhi solus dar’tome, mhi me’dinui an, mhi ba’juri verde.”

We are one when together, we are one when we’re apart, we will share all, we will raise warriors.

At Din’s feet, Grogu coos.

Nova grins, tears sparking up in her eyes. “On Mandalore, they exchange words in Mando’a. On Naboo, they read vows aloud. On Yavin, marriage was mostly made in the skies. And on Naator,” she says, carefully, “we’ve done all three. Din Djarin, you’re already my husband. In name and in love, in war and in peace, you’re the one I love. From Andromeda to Novalise to the woman I will be, you’re the one I need by my side. I’ve loved you since you saved my life the first time, and I will love you long after my bones turn back to dust.” She swallows. “You know every inch of my soul—every horrible, fractured, glowing inch—and you’ve never once looked away. I am yours in love and in life. I will be yours in death. You are the only one,” Nova mouths, her hands squeezing down on his bare ones, “who brings me back. To you, this I swear.”

“Novalise Djarin,” Din begins, carefully, eyes flickering over to their very captive audience shifting under the bareness of his words and of their gaze, “Andromeda Maluev. I think you saved my life more times than I’ve ever saved yours.” His grip is tighter, stronger, swearing every chosen word down to the marrow in her veins. “I once said I don’t believe in miracles, but I believe in you. Now, more than ever, I think they’re the same thing.” For a second, Nova thinks he’s done talking, but Din’s mouth unhinges from where it’s been pressed down to the quick. Speaking in this much succession, unmasked, his words heard by more than just her ears—it means volumes beyond what she could ever say. “Your name, Novalise, comes from the Mando’a word novay’lain. To radiate. To shine in silence. And you shine, but never just in silence. And I will follow you,” he says, the words barely above a whisper, “into the dark, into the storm, and into every war. Without question.” His eyes blaze, and then Din sighs—not out of boredom, but out of love. “To you, this I swear.”

“Din Djarin,” Bo-Katan says, and even though she’s fading back into the night, Din eclipsing everything else in Nova’s line of sight, Nova knows this, “you may kiss your bride.”

“Way ahead of you,” Din murmurs, and he crashes his lips to Nova’s. Above them, surrounding them, everything explodes into stars. Later, after the light completely leaves the sky except for the galaxy hanging, all of them dance and sing, twisting around each other like there’s nothing left to fight, like celebration is all any of them know. They build a bonfire in the night, their smiles and the flame keeping the warmth around them. The mountains surrounding them embrace the people here, standing sentinel, keeping watch. The stars glitter and dance. The leaves, yellow confetti, line the ground. Here, on Naator, there’s only family and friendship, and love, so much love. In this moment, this shining, glittering moment—it’s only Nova and Din and the family they’ve made, this home they’ve built out of starshine.

After the celebration, the group fragment off their own separate ways—Luke back to Ahch-To to teach, Leia back to Hosnian Prime to lead, Boba and Fennec back to Tatooine to guard, and Wedge, Bo-Katan, Grogu, Din, and Nova back to Mandalore to plan. There’s a war building—none of them have said the words aloud since the wedding, but plans have been made. They’re a garrison, all of them, and each of them have a part to play to make that garrison into an army. For now, everyone is gathering resources. When morning comes, Mandalore will become everything it needs to be—birthplace of their blended army, solace to the surviving Mandalorians, a truce between populations that used to be enemies, newfound Rebel base, and home to Nova and Din. But for now, it’s them in the blue darkness, newlyweds getting ready for the life ahead of them.

Walking into the palace on Mandalore feels right in a way that it’s never felt before. Nova moves up the marble steps, into the open doors of the place they call home, and she feels the rightness in her chest, something finally laid bare.

“I’ll take Grogu to bed,” Bo-Katan murmurs, squeezing Nova’s hand as she plucks him out of her tired arms. “Don’t stay up too late.”

“Thank you,” Nova calls after her, throwing the weight of her gratitude into it. Bo-Katan just nods in acknowledgement and lets Nova and Din press their own kisses onto Grogu’s big green forehead, disappearing up their staircase.

“I want to take you to bed, Mand’alor,” Din whispers into the crook of Nova’s neck, his breath rupturing goosebumps across her entire body, lighting up under the silk of her wedding dress. She lets him push her against the blue wall, lips ravenous, divine, pulling her into his gravity.

“That’s a fantastic idea,” Nova murmurs as Din’s tongue slides against her jugular, her hands knotted in his hair, “but I want to fuck you on my throne, Mandalorian.”

Din stills. Nova grins against the feeling of his tongue on her neck, flickering, halting. “You know,” he says, carefully, intentionally, “you’re the leader of this planet, Novalise. You could order me to do anything. I’d be helpless, without a choice. Needing to comply.”

Nova’s moan goes directly upward, into the vaulted cathedral ceilings. “That sounds familiar.”

She can feel the low grin stretch across Din’s mouth from where it’s anchored against her pulse point. “I may have…stolen it.”

“You make a habit of stealing things, Din Djarin?”

“For you?” Din’s hands travel lower, lower, until they’re cupped under the curve of her ass. Nova sighs as she gets lifted off the center of gravity, falling helpless to Din’s dictation. “I’d steal the stars.”

“Well,” Nova concedes, high and breathy, “if anyone could.”

With a long, languid noise, Din’s mouth pulls—regrettably—off of her neck. But when Nova sees the look on his face—hungry, wanting—she doesn’t miss the press of his tongue against her skin. “Are you going to rule with an iron fist, Mand’alor?”

“Not Mandalore,” Nova whispers, tracing the outline of his pink, bitten lips with the tip of her finger, “but you, maybe.”

A groan falls out of his open mouth, and Nova grins.

“You’re fucking devilish,” Din grits out, and Nova can feel how hard he is as his grip slips, watching the silhouette of her tongue swiping over her top lip. “The galaxy is lucky you use your power for good.”

Nova winks. She has him here, in the palm of her hand, fully enraptured. It doesn’t ever get old—the allure that comes with holding the Mandalorian’s heart, mind, and soul between her fingers. How lucky she is to have him, to love him. How lucky he is to know her, to adore her. “For the galaxy, I’ll use my power for good. But for you, Din Djarin, I’ll use my power however I damn well please.”

For a second, just a fleeting, blip of a moment, Nova wishes he had the helmet on. She wouldn’t trade the look in Din’s eyes—pure, unrestrained lust—for anything, but to be able to hear the moan that just passed through his lips through the modulator would make everything inside of her molten and wet. “Use me however you damn well please.”

Din’s looking up at her like she’s something holy. And in this shining second, Nova feels like holiness is just that—divinity, not a burden to bear. Everything inside of her is shimmering, glinting silver. The beskar he’s adorned with. The stitching that structures her dress. Everything here is shiny, eternal.

So is Nova.

“Let me down.”

Din whimpers. “But—”

“You had your turn to be in charge. That’s my throne now.” Nova hooks her finger under Din’s chin, pulling his brown eyes, reverent and half-lidded, up to gaze into hers. Slowly, she unhinges her grip and points instead to the gleaming beskar throne on top of the dais. “Do you understand me.”

It isn’t a question.

Din’s grip relinquishes as he lets her go, sliding up from the curve of her spine, over her hips, settling into the crook of her waist. Poised, ready to snap into action, but waiting for Nova’s orders.

When her feet are on the ground, solidly, Nova wets her parted lips. Din’s fingers hitch into her sides, but he doesn’t move, resolute and unyielding. Even without the helmet on, he’s acting like the Mandalorian—ready to strike, but waiting for the signal. “Get on your knees.”

Din’s eyes, dark and hazy, flash at her request.

Nova raises a singular eyebrow—the one sliced through with the scar. She watches carefully as Din’s irises flick up to it, back down to her own. All reverence. All delight. Nova steps forward, refusing to break eye contact, until she’s flush against his body. Din’s hands slide up her ankles, cupping the backs of her calves, until they anchor to the backs of her knees. Nova knows how much strength he holds, how Din could cut the sides of his hands towards his body and tumble her down to the floor. Like a knife, poised as something other than a weapon. A willing one.

Everything stills as Din looks at her. Nova bites down on her lip, lust pooling between her thighs, running like lava through her veins. She knows how much willpower she has left—it’s an hourglass counting down to nothing. If Din moves a singular muscle, she’ll crumble, relinquish every semblance of power, and beg him to fuck her here, on the floor, the throne be damned. But she watches as his lips part, tongue hanging in the open chasm of his mouth, and she has another idea.

Slowly, silently, Nova reaches up the back of her dress. In a stroke of genius, Bo-Katan’s design choices for this wedding dress included a silver zipper instead of pearly buttons up the back. In one solid, smooth stroke, Nova yanks the zipper down her spine, goosebumps erupting all the way down. Gently, she steps out of the cathedral of a dress, swiping it to the side, away from damage across the blue floor. Din watches as it slides away, Nova standing in her silver slip and nothing else, still holding all the power.

“You’re still wearing your beskar.”

“Yes, Mand’alor.” Din’s voice is so thick. It makes Nova’s blood thunder in her ears.

“Take it off.”

Din’s eyes don’t leave hers as he starts prying every single piece of it from his body. First the pauldrons, then the gilded plates on his arms, and then, finally, the chest. Dully, Nova recognizes the significance of it—his heart, too, completely in her hands. The palace is dark and quiet. Everyone else is either gone or asleep—and hopefully, for Bo-Katan’s and Grogu’s sakes, well out of earshot.

When the final piece of armor clatters ceremoniously to the floor, Nova steps forward and grabs Din’s face on either side, possessive, hungry. It’s the same way he’s grabbed her since the second they first collided—with the want of someone starving, with the weight of a collapsing star. He falls into her touch, heavenstruck, possessively.

“Do you want me, Mandalorian?”

“More than I’ve ever wanted anything,” Din manages, choked and distorted. Nova strokes a thumb over his cheekbone and Din’s eyes close, committing her to memory.

“What if I told you I wanted to fuck you on the floor?”

“Fuck, Nova—”

“Or on the holotable?”

“Anywhere,” Din vows, the words thick with lust, “Maker, any way—”

“Do you trust me?”

Din’s eyes fly back open. “If you don’t know that by now,” he whispers, “I think we might have a problem.”

Nova’s smile spreads across the entirety of her face, and the giggle she lets out bubbles up in the air around them, melodic, butterfly-winged. She leans in closer, swiping her thumb across Din’s mouth. “Protect your head,” she whispers, and as his hand comes up to shelter the back of it, Nova plants her bare foot against his chest and sends him backward.

The breath knocks out of Din’s lungs. Nova waits a beat for him to recover and then slowly sinks to her knees, the ghost of that smile still flitting across her mouth. “Good boy.”

Din groans. “I thought,” he says, words ragged, “you wanted to fuck me on your throne.”

Nova shrugs, hiking the slip up as she drops her panties to her knees, straddling Din’s chest. His breath hitches in the hollow of his throat as she gets closer and closer, sliding up across the smooth marble of the floor until she’s hinged just above Din’s mouth. “Oh, baby,” she murmurs, hooking her fingers inside of his teeth and pulling his tongue free, “I am on my throne.”

Din moans so loud that Nova can feel his body beneath her spasm. She waits, the words hinging on her mouth, but he shakes his head so vehemently that his hair moves. His hands, so obediently pressed to the ground a second ago, snap to her hips, bringing her cunt down low enough that Nova can feel the hot heat of his breath blowing up into her. “Don’t you dare.”

“What?” It comes out as breathy as Din’s does.

“I’m not having just a taste,” Din says roughly, “I’m going to fucking devour you.”

Nova squirms as he brings her down closer. “I’m in charge,” she protests, but it’s so halfhearted that Din’s laugh echoes against her bare pussy as he licks a line clean up to her clit.

“Whatever you say, Mand’alor,” Din concedes, hot and wet against her, and then he sinks her all the way down.

Nova moans as she adjusts to the rhythm and warmth of Din’s mouth. It’s only been a handful of hours since the last time he went down on her, but it feels like years. He takes his time, careful with it, and until Nova adjusts to the shock of it, he takes it slow. Agonizing. The power in his tongue is unparalleled, unlike anything she’s ever felt. Her pulse thunders in her ears as Din’s grip tightens around her hips, tongue playing everywhere but her entrance.

“You’re going to leave me bruised—”

“Good,” Din growls, and the absence of his tongue for the split second it took him to say it makes the building orgasm flutter and shake just for a second. “Don’t you dare run away. Let me drink from your cunt.”

Nova’s eyes roll back in her skull. “Oh—”

Din’s tongue finds her clit again, and Nova’s whole body thunders from the impact. She reverberates as he traces it with his tongue, once, twice, three times—and she’s a goner. Nova cries out, unintelligible. He doesn’t let up, as insistent and thorough with her pussy as he is with the bounties he hunts down. Panting, Nova tries to pull away from it, every single nerve in her body firing on all cylinders, but Din grinds her down farther.

“What did I say about running?” he croons, breath hot and intense against her.

“Not—running,” Nova pants out, “fuck, Maker above—”

“Don’t pray to the Maker. I’m your god now.” When Din’s tongue finds her entrance, he thrusts up and inside of her, and Nova screams out, a far cry from a singular moan. She’d send the entire palace thundering towards the throne room if anyone was listening, but right now, the entire galaxy fades out. Nova folds in half as Din brings out another orgasm, then another, and her thighs are shaking, ruined, by the time he’s decided he’s finished, gently placing her back down against his chest.

“Holy shit,” Nova breathes.

“Something holy, that’s for sure,” Din says, lifting his chin to meet her eyes. “I meant it when I said you weren't allowed to run from me ever again.”

Through half-lidded eyes, Nova tries to catch her breath. “I wasn’t running—”

“And I wasn’t finished, Mand’alor,” Din breathes. “How could you deprive me of tasting you until I’d drained you?”

Nova grins down at him, heart pounding against her ribcage. “Drained me? I haven’t fucked you yet.”

Din raises an eyebrow, breathing ragged and uneven.

“We still need to break in the throne up there,” she says, pointing up at the beskar on top of the dais.

“We’ve broken it in,” Din murmurs, letting Nova use his hands to brace up against as she rises, shaking, to her feet. “Or do you not remember the first time I fucked you in this room?”

“Oh, I remember it,” Nova says, grinning, grasping Din’s throat in her hand as she slowly leads them backward, towards the steps to where the dais is raised. “But that was when you were Mand’alor. It’s my turn now.”

Din’s knees sag as Nova’s hand travels down the valley of his throat to the silken blue of his underclothes. Slowly, they climb up to the top, the metal glinting even in the low light. Nova lets go of Din, just for a second, to slide both straps of her slip down over her shoulders, watching as it sparkles as it drops to the floor. On the step below, Din gathers up the fabric in his hands and tosses it off the dais altogether. It’s just Nova and her star-studded halo on the throne now.

“Holy fuck,” Din says, reverently, and if Nova coulmd’t taste divinity on his lips before, she can sure as hell see it in his eyes. “You’re—perfect, Novalise.”

Nova crosses one leg over the other, and Din’s eyes travel down her naked body, ravenous. “Take your clothes off.”

He complies. In the dark, even under midnight skies, he shines. The contours of his body—memorized, well-loved—are so familiar, equally as holy as the look of love in his eyes. Din’s eyelids flutter. “I have a confession to make.”

Nova raises her eyebrows.

Slowly, he slides the waistband of his trousers to the floor. In it, though, Nova can see the wet spot there, sticky, still gleaming on his skin. “Din,” she whispers, pussy clenching, “did you cum from eating me out?”

Silently, he nods.

“Just from that?”

“I could taste you every day for the rest of our lives,” Din breathes into the hollow of her ear, bending forward until his hard cock is flush against her bare thigh, “and cum every time from that alone.”

Nova moans.

“But I’m selfish, Nova,” he whispers, “and I want to fuck you, too.”

“I’d make you beg,” Nova pants, “but I don’t have the patience.” She reaches up, grabbing him buy the neck again, and Din’s knees lock into place as Nova pulls herself off the throne and spins them around, pushing Din’s chest so he lands back against the beskar. He looks so regal here, even without the silver adorning him, especially with nothing on at all. Nova moans as he drags her forward, kicking her legs open so that she can straddle him. “Tell me you want me,” she whispers, into the open air behind them.

Everything stills. “I’ve never wanted you more,” Din manages, and then he’s thrusting up into her as Nova sinks down. Her eyes roll back in her head. Nova cries out as he ruts into her, feverish, devilish, desire coursing through his veins like he’s never fucked before.

“Din—”

“I know, sweet girl,” he murmurs, teeth sinking into her neck, “I know.”

For a moment, neither of them can speak. Nova moans, the sounds higher and higher, floating clean up through the vaulted ceiling to the stars above. On Mandalore, it’s a rare, starry night—the fog disappearing long enough for every single shining locus in the sky to hear their worship.

“I’m—yours,” Din slurs, breath hot and heavy in her ear, “fuck, Nova, I’m all—”

“Wait for me,” she pants, already cresting on the edge of her orgasm. She wanted it to last forever—the sex on their wedding night—but as Din cries out into her ear, Nova’s ready. “I’m gonna—”

“Don’t make me wait anymore,” Din growls, hips slamming into her as he pounds her, relentless, both of them unanchored and edging towards a supernova.

“Cum for me,” Nova manages, and stars above, he does. Right as he erupts, spilling hot, pearly ropes into her, Nova clenches down, and they go over the edge together. As they always do. As they always will.

And on the comedown, foreheads pressed together, the words fall from Din’s swollen lips: “We have all night for more.”

Nova grins, leaning in to press her mouth to his. “We have forever.”

They stay like that, intertwined together, bodies hinged into a two-headed animal, until both Nova and Din can catch their breath. Finally, with a disentanglement of limbs, clothes collected off the floor, Din holds out his arm.

“Let me take you to bed, Mand’alor.”

Nova laughs, low and long, her smile sleepy and eternal across her face. “Don’t think I can walk up the stairs, Mandalorian.”

Din’s arms scoop her up, collapsing her body in a roll down the middle, and Nova links her hands around his neck. “This is something newlyweds do, anyway.” He notices her furrowed eyebrows, a small laugh bubbling out of his mouth. “Carry you over the doorstep.”

“We’ve slept in this room a thousand times before, Din,” Nova whispers, but she lets herself be swept into his arms anyways, carried up the steps.

“Tradition,” he mumbles, half-asleep, and when he carries her over the vestibule of their bedroom, Nova grins up at him. It’s not a Mandalorian tradition. It’s something else entirely. “I love you,” he says, silhouetted in the moonlight. “Did you know that?”

“Vaguely,” Nova yawns, crawling into the silk of their bedsheets, settling right into the crook of Din’s arms. “You’ve given me a few hints.” He laughs out loud, an unrestricted, melodic thing, and Nova’s heart sings in her chest. “I always wanted for something more,” she whispers, against the warmth of his chest. “More meaningful, more…more like home. I don’t need to wish anymore.”

Din folds her into his arms, like he’s always done, like he always will. “It’s deeper than that word can hold,” he agrees, fading off into sleep, Nova’s heart beating in tandem with his, “but yeah, Nova. We’re both home.”

And when Nova dreams tonight, it’s with her lightsaber in one hand and her husband’s in the other. She can feel that something deeper, the eternal pulse for more, saiated, full. The people that stand next to her—Rebels and Mandalorians and Skywalkers and everything in between—they’ve become her new family. Her parents are somewhere in the great beyond, fortifying her, keeping the orange that forged her alive. There are thousands of people that have become Rebels, united in resisting all the evil that lives in the underbelly of the galaxy. This isn’t like last time. This isn’t going to plunge the universe into something insurmountable. And, sure, whatever darkness is coming—and there is a multitude of evil, murky and midnight, uncertain but forming—will be strong.

But Novalise Andromeda Maluev Djarin is stronger. And the army next to her, the people that have become her family, they know how to beat the darkness.

Pull its mouth open. Threaten it with light.

EPILOGUE

“You’re up early.”

Bo-Katan affixes Wedge with a tired—yet somehow still withering—stare. Earlier, after she was certain Nova and Din were done desecrating the throne room, she had snuck back into it, powering the holotable on. Everything in the room is lit up azure, that incessant, never-ending blue. “I never went to sleep.”

He smiles, but it’s fleeting, taut around the edges. The night has clouded back over, but the grey is fading into something warmer. Above them, any minute, the sun is about to rise. “What’s wrong?”

“Before the wedding,” Bo-Katan sighs, moving around the blue glare of the holotable to meet Wedge on the other side, “I went to Yavin.”

Wedge just raises a bushy eyebrow.

“I…I went to Nova’s old barracks. Where she lived with her family.”

“I know the place,” Wedge says, sadly, and Bo-Katan feels her chest squeeze, just for a second. She can’t get distracted, can’t get deterred. She wipes her exhausted eyes, trying to shake the sleep loose. “What did you find?”

“What I needed for Nova’s dress. Thread, that veil she wore. But before I left to go to Naator, Grogu would not follow me. He kept running off down the main hallway, and he refused to come back—or let me pick him up—until I followed him instead. Into a…into a war room. It looked like—”

“A ghost town.”

“Like it hadn’t been used in years, yeah.” Bo-Katan nods. “But there was a…distress signal. And I thought it was new, maybe. But all the distress signals, everything in communication—they’re all regularly rerouted to Hoth. And all of them will be rerouted here, now, to Mandalore. So this one—”

“Must have been old.”

“Stop interrupting me,” Bo-Katan snarls, and then realizes what Wedge is saying, clocks how calm his face is. Suspicious, she raises an eyebrow. “Why…why the hell aren’t you surprised?”

“I came from Hoth.”

“Yeah, Wedge. I know.” Bo-Katan sighs through her nose, a heavy smoker’s exhale. She turns around, flicking through the thousands of old Mandalorian and Rebel files on the holotable in front of her, letting Wedge filter out so she can bring up the distress call.

“I came from Hoth,” Wedge repeats, watching Bo-Katan carefully as she taps out her password on the holotable, trying to bring the distress call up, “where I ran into General Syndulla.”

“Mhm,” Bo-Katan says, half listening, still running through the archives.

“She told me about this Star Destroyer.”

Bo-Katan rolls her eyes. “Who gives a fuck about a Star Destroyer, Wedge, there’s a million of them. Did she give you an identifying number—”

“Bo-Katan—”

“Yeah. Quite frankly, I don’t need the identifying number right now. I need you to hear this distress call—”

“Bo-Katan, listen to me—”

“Wedge, just shut up—”

“General Kryze!” Wedge yells, and both Wedge yelling and using her formal title is so wildly out of character that Bo-Katan shuts up and listens. “I spoke to General Syndulla. On Hoth. About a missing Star Destroyer.”

Bo-Katan’s eyes narrow. Her heartbeat picks up, rapidly, dizzying. “Did you say—”

“General Syndulla. A missing Star Destroyer. Are you listening to me?”

And suddenly, with the force of a tractor beam, Bo-Katan realizes her and Wedge are talking about the exact same thing. “You don’t need to listen to the distress call,” she whispers, slowly, as everything snaps into place, “because you don’t need the identifying number.”

Wedge nods. “It’s the Chimera. It’s back.”

Bo-Katan stares from Wedge to the holotable, then back at Wedge. Silently, suddenly awake, she slides her helmet back on. “Wedge,” Bo-Katan says, her voice ringing out even and clear, “someone needs to wake up the Mand’alor.”

I HOPE YOU LOVED IT!!! i'm so, SO sorry that it took me ~3 months to give you this final chapter. i was in the hospital for the fourth time this year, had multiple work-related breakdowns, had to have surgery (again), dealt with more UTIs (again), and have not been by best self. my 2022 started out with sepsis and nearly dying, and truthfully, i've been fighting tooth and nail for almost a full year now to fully come back from it. i've been emotionally, mentally, and physically unable to write for so much of this year, and it's devastated me. i haven't felt like myself in a very long time, but slowly writing this final chapter allowed the parts of me that i'm proudest of to shine through again. i'm so sorry for being so wishy-washy and disappearing and always having an end-of-the-world excuse every time i've popped back up on the map. it's been so hard. i don't want to spend forever lamenting, but just know that Something Deeper is such an integral part of me, and the reason why its been gone is inexplicably tied to why i've been gone. you all mean the absolute world to me. thank you so much for caring, for your loyalty, and for being so wonderful to me and my chronically ill body every step of the way. this chapter is a love letter to you. you mean more than i could ever put into words, but i promise i'll keep trying.

xoxo, amelie

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