*****

I watch him. Study the poses he makes, guide him through the steps of the ancient saber-dance. Criticize severely afterward, but secretly think that even though the pose was not correct, he still looked beautiful and graceful.

He'll never be as tall as me, but will be infinitely more graceful. His body will eat the air as if he were a bird, curving and twisting with the smoothness of a perfectly trained Jedi.

Because, yes, he will be perfectly trained. Even if it means suppressing all my desires until his Knighthood. I will not compromise his sense of self, will not make him dependent on me for love and training, together.

I will be his master. Only that. Until the day comes when my hand cuts his braid and I am finally free from my vow of protection.

I will hold true to what I believe, no matter what my heart screams at me to do.

*****

Time brings him beauty. He trips along the skin of air as though it were as steady as a rock. He is graceful, peaceful, and perfect.

He has faults, of course. A certain tendency to talk back to his master, a certain lack of respect to Jedi elders.

But they all expect that, and if he talks back to me it's my own just desserts, I can see them all thinking. Serve you right, Qui-Gon Jinn, the Always-Must-Follow-Heart one.

And the talking back is a relief. At least he is not besotted with me, and shows no sign of the typical padawan crush.

Or is that a relief? Do I secretly *want* him head over heels about me? Do I?

*****

Time brings me death. And the sudden first emotion I feel is despair. How I'd longed to say just a single word of love to him, but time did not allow. How I'd longed to just kiss him once.

How I wished I'd seized him when I had the chance. And now never? Until the last days and years, when his hands touch mine in his own death? Is there a way back to him, I wonder and plead?

I reach out. With hands and heart and mind. My life and love *might* still go on, if this works.

I touch him. He is older now, and time has brought him pain, but it has also brought him wisdom. He sits quiet on the sandy floor of a dark hut, waiting.

His eyes fly open at the touch of my hand.

And then he is smiling at me, and the pain that was written so clear across his face fades.

"Qui-Gon," he says, and the voice is low, accented in those tones I know so well.

I gaze at him for a long moment, then, wordless, take him in my arms and kiss him.

His lips are yielding under mine.

END