Sanctuary

[Salem Ave]

Villa Solis – Terephon – Hapes Cluster

It was hunting season and yet the roasting pits at Villa Solis were cold and unlit.

Salem Ave stood in one corner of the white gratenite patio that surrounded the squat, domed buildings that made up the villa. In every direction, he could see nothing but swampland. It was almost possible to imagine that he was not standing on Hapan soil, such was the glamour of the Transitory Mists. They kept the wider Galaxy at bay whilst also separating the fringe worlds of the Consortium from the rest of the Hapes Cluster. Only the interior of the villa, with its luxurious baths and tanning vats, bore any resemblance to the grand, decadence of the Cluster's interior region.

Circumstances being what they were – with the court deep in discussion as to whether working with the Alliance of Free Planets was a good idea – the entire Galney family had gone to Hapes proper, mindful of the fact that to remain on Terephon would be to put themselves as far as they physically could be from royal court and city. At least, without removing themselves from Consortium territory. Little did they know, they'd left the heart - and future - of the Consortium behind them on Terephon.

There was the sound of footsteps behind Salem. His guests.

“I trust you've found everything here to your satisfaction.”

[Elaine Alastor]

Compared to how the last year of their lives had been spent, satisfaction was probably too light a term to apply to being nearly returned to the bosom worlds of their birth. Or so Elaine thought. Deep enough in the Mist to be just 'backwater' enough, and yet so undeniably a part of the decadence of the Consortium that the term should not truly apply, Terephon was at least a world that she had visited before. Though it had been many years since she had set foot here, not much had changed. Except that it was hunting season.. and Tristan was, very obviously, not here.

They found themselves grateful guests, a strange situation for them both. Though her eyes did not leave their host to rest upon the man at her side, she was very aware of his presence there. Indeed, she had done all but command him to remain in her shadow ever since leaving behind Shedu Maad.

"More than satisfactory, Minister.", she forced a smile where there was none. "Villa Solis has always been a lovely retreat."

"What would please me more is answers."

[Aaron Belargic]

Beside the princess, her shadow looked as if he had just stepped out of the swamps of Shedu Maad. He wore what remained of his Commodore's uniform. The sleeves had been torn from his jacket and the once proud royal blue fabric was now a much darker, dirtier shade. Repeated requests had been made for Aaron to relinquish the sword at his hip and yet there it hung, sheathed but no less a threat for it.

He had not slept in what must have been days and the fatigue was plainly written in the lines beneath his eyes. Whatever the comforts of Villa Solis were, Aaron would not succumb to them. Though they'd at least been able to escape Shedu Maad, that didn't mean they were out of danger all together.

He knew the face of their host. It had been years (http://sw-fans.net/forum/showthread.php?15984-Splendid-Isolation) since he had first encountered the Prime Minister of Onderon, but there was something about the man's face that was not easily forgotten.

If Onderon was still a loyal friend to the Chume Ishara, there was a good chance that Salem Ave's hospitality was a formality – a delaying tactic until the Chume was able to dispatch the appropriate forces to retrieve her daughter and dispose of the exiled Commodore. He took a step closer to Elaine as that fear dug its claws into him, unable to conceal a frown.

[Salem Ave]

Salem considered the state of his guests.

The months had not been kind to the Commodore. He looked exhausted, a man on the edge of collapse and held upright only by... fear, perhaps? Or fierce loyalty to the Hapan princess. It was hard to say, though both the Commodore and the princess were bristling with a dozen conflicting emotions. Elaine was perhaps a little red in the cheek, from many hours spent in the wilds of Shedu Maad but otherwise looked as beautiful as ever, if not more so; such was the potency of Hapan blood, Salem supposed.

“Of course. I will answer any and all questions you have. However, before we go on there is.. something that you must know.”

His attention was focused solely on Elaine.

“I am sad to say that your mother is.. dead.”

[Elaine Alastor]

Ishara was dead?

A year's worth of stress from constantly running, or hiding, or doing whatever else it took to survive on Shedu Maad, or a combination of it all, had not broken the princess. She had managed it as best she could, given the circumstances. The point was, that even though the stress had been considerable, she had endured. Surely this news should make her feel something? Her mother was dead. Shouldn't she cry? Elaine swayed on her feet for a minute, her hand instinctively reaching out to her side for the support she knew she would find.

"Dead..?", she repeated, trying to process the information. They had both been so sure that the first thing they would encounter was her mother's forces coming to escort her home, willing or no. It had never occurred to her during her time stranded on Shedu Maad that other events were also playing out in others lives as well.

Ishara had been the picture of glowing health.. that left few options as to how the Hapan Monarch had perished. Questions one after the other assaulted her mind, each vying to be asked first. How? When? Who? Who ruled now? She refused to give voice to any of them.

Breathing once slowly to steady herself, the princess made a gesture to Minister Ave to proceed. "Start at the beginning. Tell me everything."

[Salem Ave]

He told her everything, the truth of it all – or at least, the truth told slant. Even Salem himself could not have planned how quickly the House of Alastor would, with the lightest of touches, begin to fall apart. Though Ishara Alastor had been murdered at his command, her children had written their own fates and had they not acted so willfully, there was a good chance that Salem would not be in the position of significant power and influence that he found himself in today.

It had begun with Elaine's flight from the Consortium (http://sw-fans.net/forum/showthread.php?19051-Our-Darkest-Days-Echoes). He told her how her withdrawal from Hapes had been perceived. “Do not misunderstand me: there are many who long for your return, princess. However there are some who believe you chose to run from the Consortium and in doing so relinquished your sovereignty.”

He told her how – by cloak of night – her brother Tristan had likewise fled his responsibilities (http://sw-fans.net/forum/showthread.php?19191-The-Once-and-Future-Prince) in search of lands still unknown. “In this,” Salem said, head bowing for a moment. “I feel a weight of.. great guilt. Onderon was and still is under my guidance and protection. My search for the prince continues and you may rest assured that I will find him, in time.”

He told her how Tristan's wife - who some called his widow - had borne a child. How she had taken the child to the Hapan court (http://sw-fans.net/forum/showthread.php?18801-Bring-Me-the-Head-of-Ishara-Alastor) – and how she had remained there since, duty-bound. How not long after, the Chume had been found murdered in her sleep – though he neglected to mention that her head was not found with her body. “It is believed that a... cabal of your mothers malefactors came together on this matter, though Hapan Security has not uncovered a culprit – nor have any further attempts been made against the crown.”

For everything he'd told her, Salem didn't doubt that there would be twice as many questions to come.

“Razielle acts as regent in your nieces stead. The galaxy is a place... much changed during your year of absence.”

[Aaron Belargic]

Each new revelation was a new weight on Aaron's shoulders and though Elaine reached out to him for strength and support, he himself was struggling to stand. The Chume was dead? The prince was missing? How could so much have changed in such a short space of time? It didn't matter to Belargic that Ishara had banished him from the Consortium; she was ereneda! A goddess to her people! What wretched, treasonous cur would lift a hand to her? Aaron shook his head, unwilling – unable – to believe that his own people could be so traitorous.

“I am.. so sorry for your loss, princess.”

[Elaine Alastor]

As Minister Ave began to tell her all that she had missed, Elaine had been standing upright and attentive. Despite the fact that she was wearing the same borrowed clothes that she had been trying to keep together since the crash, and that the boots laced up her royal calves had been pulled from a dead man with small feet, she was no less a princess. Elaine had known from the first hours after taking that shuttle, there was going to be a high cost for her actions, and she was ready to accept it with grace. She had assumed that the damage had followed her to Shedu Maad. Not so, it seemed it extended far beyond ever her own worst fears.

They were right to believe she had relinquished her right to rule. She had run from the Consortium. The whole thing had been her idea and she had dragged Aaron into it with her. Making no comment on it, she waited bravely for the Prime Minister to tell it all, but when he told her that her brother was not just absent, he was missing...something inside Elaine finally snapped, bearing more than she could take.

Heedless of the cost of the shimmersilk covering, Elaine sank her filthy, beleaguered self onto a padded bench. She listened to the confirmation of what she had expected, that her mother had indeed been assassinated. Nodding her head that she understood but her attention remained on the patterned floor, which was becoming blurry as a few hot tears dripped down her slightly dirty, reddened face. Aaron's words, while appreciated could not comfort her. Not when she felt responsible for so much.

"I have a niece?" That seemed to penetrate her grief. Elaine lifted her red-rimmed gaze to Minister Ave, for confirmation. Tristan's wife Razielle had a little girl, who would one day be Queen Mother. A right that should have been her own, a responsibility that she had been bred for, and had run from.

"I should speak to Razielle.", she said, absently wiping her cheeks and regaining her composure.

[Salem Ave]

The grief borne of her actions weighed Elaine Alastor down like a physical thing. Salem didn't move forward to console her, but his expression was grave.

“I have sent word to the Queen Regent of your safe return,” he said. Lying. He had told no one. Not yet, at least. Only the crew of the ship that had recovered the princess knew of her whereabouts. They were now stationed in temporary orbit above Terephon and were under strict instruction to maintain radio silence.

“I.. believe she intends to travel here as soon as she is able. Until then, it would be remiss of me if I did not ask you to stay awhile. To regain your strength.. and to allow the medical staff here to ensure that you are well.” - and that you are not carrying anything contagious that you contracted on Shedu Maad, he added as a mental afterthought.

[Aaron Belargic]

He thought of his brother Dasquian, and the day that all of this had begun. When the Chume had summoned Aaron before her court, to announce that Dasquian had been captured and killed by the Galactic Empire (http://sw-fans.net/forum/showthread.php?19051-Our-Darkest-Days-Echoes&p=296389&viewfull=1#post296389). Aaron had felt nothing then. An emptiness, a void of emotion in his chest where there should have been grief and sadness, equal to that written on Elaine's face. He wanted to say something – to say anything – but there were no words of consolation that he could offer. Instead, he walked to Elaine's side and settled a hand onto her shoulder.

[Elaine Alastor]

She was beyond caring what the action might imply, when Aaron's hand curled around her shoulder offering her comfort, Elaine's own hand covered his drawing strength from the contact. He was the only one who could understand what she had gone through, because he had gone through the whole thing with her, right at her side. She was in no hurry to have him leave it either.

Rising she nodded to Minister Ave. She had known him only as the Prime Minister of Onderon. Somehow he had become the voice of the Consortium's regent? Elaine betrayed nothing of her thoughts, but accepted his hospitality.

"Thank you. I would like to refresh myself at once." She knew very well she looked nothing like the exquisite Hapan princess she had been bred to be.

[Salem Ave]

“Of course,” Salem dipped his head for a moment as the princess rose to her feet. He gestured towards the villa. Though there were guards dotted about the place, in the greys and greens of Onderon, they would not bar Elaine Alastor from going wherever she intended to go. Their presence was a formality; a nod to the fact that Minister Ave was a foreign delegate and therefore could not expect to have statuesque Hapan guardswomen at his disposal, when there was Onderonian soldiers fit for the job.

“There are rooms for you both, and you make may use of the rest of the villa as you please,” he went on. “If you require any assistance, my staff are yours to command.”

[Aaron Belargic]

Aaron eyed the Onderonian soldiers. He would have liked nothing more than to soak a tub of water almost too hot to touch, but it was not to be.

“I will stand on guard while you ready yourself, Chume'da,” he said, deliberately speaking in the Basic tongue for the benefit of the Minister's men. For their part, the guards did not scoff at Aaron, who looked as if he could hardly stand to guard himself against a light breeze let alone any intrusion. There was steel in his eyes, however, and a stubborn determination to the way that he stood with his shoulders squared, in spite of the fatigue that weighed on them.

[Elaine Alastor]

Again, Elaine gave Minister Ave another slow nod of thanks. As the the Hapan heiress such was not a common public occurrence for her. It had bred into her very being not to thank others for the things they did for her. They were expected to accommodate her in every way possible. It was their job, as it was hers to be the Princess Elaine. It was just the way things were, or had been..

Keeping close to Aaron's side, she followed the Onderonian guards as they led them through the villa's halls toward their designated rooms. Coming to her own first the doors were opened into what must have been one of the estate's grandest suites. It had it's own terrace which opened into a secured courtyard, also staffed with green and grey garbed guards under the orders of Minister Ave. There was a spacious bedroom, fit for the princess she was, as well as a sitting room designed for receiving other guests of the Villa Solis. The most welcome sight for Elaine was the bathing chamber, a sonic shower awaited and a bath that would swallow her up to her neck. Hot water! Not some stagnant pool, but a real bath.

The guard quietly, discreetly announced that Commodore Belargic's rooms were adjacent to the princesses own, and that he would be delighted to show him on.

"We've just found our way around Shedu Maad for more than a year.", Elaine said with a bit of vexation in her tone. "I think we can manage to cross the hall unaccompanied. You are dismissed."

Whatever the reason, she did not appreciate dealing with Onderonian guards in the midst of Consortium lands. They had managed to leave Elaine with the impression that she was not really returned to Hapes.. Not yet.

[Aaron Belargic]

Aaron watched the guardsmen go, though he was under no illusion that this left the two of them unattended. Sharp eyes took in the suite. This was the villa of a prominent noble house. As such, there was absolutely no doubt in Aaron’s mind that for all its ornate architecture and decoration, there was more to Villa Solis than met the eye. Surveillance could and would be concealed within the brickwork with as much artistry as had been applied to the paintings that hung on the walls.

“I do not think it would be wise for us to remain here too long, princess,” Belargic said, once again speaking the Hapan tongue.