The Captive Heart (interlude between chapters 12&13)
by Nightsister
Category: AU; Dark Fantasy/Gothic Romance/Celtic Saga
Rating: Overall UK 18/US NC-17 for scenes of horror, some violence and sex (but none of it, I hope, gratuitous).
Series: Yes. This story is the third part of a Qui-Gon trilogy which began with 'Dreams Made Flesh' and continued in 'Severance'. Both can be found in the QJEB and Temple Voices archives and in the Cloister (url below).
Time frame: Set during the time of the original trilogy.
Pairing: Han/Leia mostly; also reference to Qui-Gon/OFC and Obi-Wan/Eirtae.
Spoilers: To the films (obviously). Also some minor ones to various novels and to The Tales of the Jedi comic books/graphic novels. Some conjecture about events which may or may not take place in episode 2 (but I can't say for sure whether these will ever amount to spoilers - they are simply wild guesses).
Disclaimer: The Star Wars characters and universe are owned by George Lucas/Lucasfilm Ltd. With all due respect to Lucas, this reworking of the characters is for my own amusement only and I make no profit from it. Other characters (principally the Baobhan-sith) are copyright me, as is the selection and order of the words used herein.
Feedback: It would be nice to know from time to time that someone out there is reading this and by some fluke enjoying it. So send me feedback please.
Archive: On QJEB and Temple Voices. It's also available at
Flights of Fancy.
Pronunciation: Cailleach Bheur = cal'yach vare
Fuil nan sluagh = ful nan slooa
Ban-fhaidh = paunai with a soft p
Date: 11/08/2001
Interlude
---------
Through Air That's Crystal Black Ink Shadows.
Acknowledgements: The chapter title is from the track The Headless Clay Woman by And Also The Trees on their Virus Meadow album.
.............................................It was a time of gloom, of cold and ice. Winter. The season of death and dark had fallen quickly over the twilight lands of Tamhasg. In the space of days the landscape had changed from bright autumnal groves to quivering skeletal trees haunting against the night sky. Sadness covered all the land. Yaddle tramped through the sleeping forest fearful of what she would find at the sith-bhrugh. Caer Ibhormheith was their personification of the Cailleach Bheur who as the hag would smite the land in winter with her icy touch and as the maid would cause the world to blossom in the spring. This glacial chill that had fallen upon the world was unnatural and Yaddle feared for Ibhormheith. For her safety, for her sanity.
She and Even both had felt it drawing near, the semblance of their old lives, of the Force, calling them. Did it call to Qui-Gon too? Had it claimed him already? Had he now turned away from the Baobhan-sith ways? Was that why Iva had smothered the land with the curse of winter?
Yaddle hesitated before the entry to the barrow. It was quite and still in the clearing. Ice lay across the ground, hung from the bare branches of the trees, weighed down the gorse and heather like grief. She took one step forward, reluctant to speak, to intrude upon the uncanny silence. The sith-bhrugh was dark, no candle flame illuminated the chambers, no incense burnt its fragrance into the air.
Yaddle sighed. Oh Iva. Oh Qui-Gon. What has happened to you? She did not want to venture further, did not want to face the awful truth, yet know she must.
She stole forward silently between the great stones that lined the passageway to the central chamber. But all was empty. It seemed she was alone, yet she sensed something beyond, just beyond, the bounds of her perception. Something not quite alive, something not quite human. She peered into the shadowy alcove at the rear of the chamber.
"Iva," she called, sure it was her.
A voice came back to her, the hoarse cry of a raven. "Gone, it's all gone now."
Yaddle crept forward slowly, knowing she had to confront the thing that was Iva and yet not Iva. The Cailleach watched her approach with sharp eyes that bore the same chill as that which had fallen over the twilight lands. Yaddle resisted the temptation to cower back in awe and fear. This was only Iva, clothed though she was in the skin of the winter hag. Beneath the ashen skin, the blue-black lips and the tangled darkness of the matted hair, there was the wild, strange woman Yaddle had grown to admire, that had shared blood, her virtue, with the Jedi, with Yaddle herself. Though she appeared in this fearful terrible form, Yaddle did not fear her.
"What is that?" Yaddle nodded towards the Cailleach's hands. She cradled something there. Something small and hard.
Iva held out her hands. A rock. Stained crimson. "Fuil nan sluagh," she said.
Yaddle understood. The blood of the sluagh. The host of the unforgiven dead, the most formidable of the sithich folk. Yaddle knew that it was only crotal, a lichen, beautiful and red, the sign of rocks melted by the frost. She knew too that it was an omen of a great battle. That Iva would read it as their doom.
Yaddle reached out and touched the skeletal, clawed hand. "Iva, what is happening here? Where is Qui-Gon?"
"Gone. Left to be with the Force. Gone."
Yaddle could hear the despair behind the harshness of the words. She didn't believe that. Not that Qui-Gon had gone back, could go back, not without them all.
"No, Iva," she said. "That's not true." Yaddle knew her own confusion as she felt the Force again after all these long years. "He's not gone. Just confused. You must go to him, you must find him."
"He left. He didn't say a word. He just left."
Yaddle could sense the loss in Iva's voice. It was grief that had called the Cailleach. Misery that had turned the land over to winter. As she looked she saw the hag's ghastly face shift, to reveal the tenderness of the woman's eyes beneath. Eyes that held unshed tears.
"And do you believe that means he does not need your help?" Yaddle knew she must spark motivation. "That he doesn't want you to go after him. That he doesn't want you?"
Iva only sighed. The Cailleach's hard shell formed over her again.
Yaddle knew she must resort to harsher means. Despite the disparity in size, she hauled on Iva's arm, pulling her across the chamber to where a chest overflowed to spill possessions, the tools of Iva's art, onto the floor. Yaddle held a mirror up to the Cailleach's face. "Do you think that if you wear that, Qui-Gon will not want you?" She shook Iva. "If that is so you are mistaken. He loves you. He needs you. He needs you now. Now, most especially."
The Cailleach turned from the mirror, Iva turned her face, her own face, ivory skin, red-brown hair, rose-flushed lips, on Yaddle. Her mouth opened slightly, the formation of a no.
"*I* need you, Iva. Even needs you."
"The Force. It's reclaimed him. He's going back to the Force."
Yaddle couldn't think what to say for a moment. That was true. That was what she had sensed. Better to face the truth then.
"Well of course he is." Yaddle spoke slowly. "It's time, isn't it? The time of the prophesies. Your prophesies."
Iva lowered her head. "My work's done."
Yaddle didn't want to believe that. This woman, for all her strangeness, had saved them. This woman was part of their future, a cog in the wheel of destiny that would return the Jedi, the wielders of the light, the Force, to their rightful place in the order of the universe. She stepped back, put her hands on her hips.
"No." A scolding tone. "No, it isn't Iva. The Force and the Spirit have to become one. They have to meld, remember? You're both needed. You and Qui-Gon. He can't do it without you."
"Why did he go?"
Yaddle sensed that Iva's grief was too deep to assuage with mere words, mere argument. Still she tried.
"To think things through. To straighten out his feelings."
Iva looked at her sharply, despairingly. The Cailleach still lapped at her features, am impression of great age and ugliness washing across her face like waves upon a shore. Love, Yaddle knew, this was all about love.
"He loves you, Iva. He still loves you. But this is hard for him." Yaddle knew this was true. It was hard for her too. She transposed her own feelings onto Qui-Gon. "He's been here thirty years. Lived with you. Lived according to your ways. Now it's changing again. It's as hard for him as it is for you." She took Iva's hand. "As it is for me," she added softly.
Iva said nothing. Yaddle felt for both of them. She wanted Qui-Gon back too. He was their guide, their anchor. She and Even looked to him.
"He still loves you, Iva."
Iva closed her eyes. Tears welled out from beneath the lids. But there were no sobs. This was no longer grief. Finally she spoke, hesitantly still, but calmer now.
"Do you think it will work out?" she asked.
"Yes, I'm sure of it."
Yaddle knew it had to. Why else were they here? But she had her doubts about the future too. Why not? Iva was a ban-fhaidh, a seer. She could trace the threads of the future, of destiny, in the tapestry of time. Yet if she knew how changeable the sands of time could be, how then could Yaddle know. It was no weakness, to doubt like this. Yet it must be overcome.
"Qui-Zhang will lead the children here," she said. She put more assurance than she felt into her voice. "Prophesies don't always work out in the way we expect. We both know that."
Yaddle knew that. All the Jedi had known that. The Chosen One had not brought them the salvation they had expected.
"But he will do it," she added, certain now. "Yes, I'm sure."
Iva nodded.
"So am I, Yaddle. It's just..."
Yaddle knew what she meant. Exactly what she meant. She felt it to, for Even.
"I know." She looked at Iva and smiled. A shared secret, a secret of love that only women knew. "Go find, Qui-Gon. It's coming, the future, and we can't face it without him."