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Chapter Text

In retrospect, Obi-Wan should have known she’d react this way. He thought about calling her after the Council forced him to take time to rest. He thought about calling her the entire time he was in hyperspace. He even thought about calling her in the midst of landing to sound calm and casual, like he was popping over for a quick visit instead of needing some very real help decompressing after his last mission. But all of that required a cover story for anyone who thought too hard about his presence on Mandalore.

No, it was better to just accept the lecture and nod along. Yes, I was too reckless. You’re right. I should’ve called. No, I don’t have to always go along with Anakin’s plans. And so on until Satine was satisfied and he could slip in a very endearing But did you miss me? so she would say No, not really with a smile on her face.

This particular lecture provided no such opening, much to his disdain. A frown adorned his face but that was yet another mistake. 

“Don’t pout at me like a child when you only deign to make an appearance if you look moments from death!” 

That had to be an exaggeration! He’d definitely looked worse, though bringing that up wouldn’t do him any favors.

“You don’t have to bandage me up, you know. I’m more than capable of doing it myself.” 

“Do you want to do it yourself?”

“No,” he said grinning. 

“Then I suggest you use that Jedi power of will to keep your mouth shut, Master Kenobi.”

Satine’s hands were very daintily tending to the cuts and bruises that covered his body, but her words had no such gentleness. He had yet to tell her how he’d come by such extensive injuries and, while such a revelation would certainly shift the target of her irritation, being reprimanded was something he secretly enjoyed. Satine seldom showed mild emotion over anything she cared about (be it person or cause) and Obi-Wan cherished the idea that someone loved him enough to show concern. 

“At some point this evening you will be explaining yourself,” she told him when he winced at her hand brushing over a particularly tender bruise. 

“Why would I want to ruin our time together with the truth?” 

“I wasn’t asking.”

It couldn’t be avoided forever, he supposed. But it was so nice to pretend he just dropped in on a whim rather than acknowledge reality. Most of their relationship in its current form was spent admiring each other via holocall. It was rare he and Satine had the pleasure of each other’s company in person. The handful of moments they shared on Coruscant tended towards impulsive and secretive romance. 

Their usual Mandalore routine - if one could even call it a routine - was Obi-Wan stumbling into her bedroom, harmed in some way or another, trying to play it cool like he wasn’t using every ounce of energy to compartmentalize whatever he’d been through. Obi-Wan felt immensely guilty over this. The little nagging voice in the back of his head, the one he couldn’t meditate away even after years of trying, had him convinced he was taking advantage of Satine’s kindness. How very audacious of him to travel days through hyperspace, drop in unannounced and in a state that would worry anyone, only to lay his trauma at her feet and ask her to fix him before he disappeared the following morning. But he couldn’t help himself, it was like a compulsion. He’d been limping into a ship and setting coordinates before anyone could ask about his recovery. In private, Satine would never turn him away. Obi-Wan believed that. And so, desperately, he tried to pour every ounce of Ben he could muster into those private moments. If he capitalized on her love to tend his wounds it was the least he could do. Never enough, though. No matter the angle from which he viewed the situation, Obi-Wan did not deserve Satine.

He expressed this to her once and, when she was finished acting marginally offended, Satine likened his Mandalore visits to coming home from a long day at work. I am here to support you because I love you, she’d told him. You don’t have to recover from everything alone. Tonight, he was sure he needed that more than ever.

When she finished with the last of the bandages, Satine poured them both a cup of hot tea to relax. She sat close enough to pull at the loose thread on the leg of his pants but kept to her own seat to avoid causing him any pain from leaning on his cuts and bruises. He was thankful she wasn’t pressing him to talk (not yet anyway) and sitting in silence with her was comforting. Not holding her even though she was sitting close enough? Less so. 

“I’m not going to break, Satine.” 

“Looks like someone gave it their best shot,” she replied apprehensively. 

The comment made him chuckle, but Satine wasn’t quite as amused. It was different, he supposed, when she’d been able to see him being injured. Not that she reacted well then either, but the air of mystery gave her an anxious disposition that felt out of character. The atmosphere turned expectant and maybe, he thought, the sooner it was over the sooner he could get back to being doted on.  

“Alright,” he conceded. “But you’re not going to like it.” 

“When have I ever?” 

It wasn’t often he was envious of the ability to spin a story into something grander than the nightmare it had been. Quinlan Vos came to mind. Obi-Wan listened to him turn the most mundane of assignments into tales that enraptured entire cantinas. But he didn’t have the energy to embody his friend’s talent so instead he recounted the plain truth: that on their mission to rescue the people of Kiros, he was captured. That he was chained and tortured. That, despite their attempted escape, Obi-Wan was enslaved on Kadavo with all the colonists he was trying to rescue who were whipped every time he did something deemed out of line. 

Obi-Wan told most of his story to their intertwined hands resting in his lap. The longer his story dragged on, the more difficult it became to continue. She let her fingers drift through his hair and squeezed his hand encouragingly. 

“It was… debilitating. What the point if I can’t…” he trailed off. What was the point? He sacrificed this life – the one with Satine he was grasping at the edges of – to swear by ideals that slipped further away every day. The word peacekeeper rang hollow in his ears and had for some time. How much of him was still Jedi and how much had turned soldier? “The one thing I should be able to do is protect innocents.”

“You did. You never stopped fighting for them and freed them in the end. An imperfect rescue is still a successful rescue.”

“I know you’re right, but it doesn’t stop me from feeling that I should have been quicker or cleverer - that I could have spared them the extra suffering had I been a better Jedi.” 

Satine pressed her lips to his temple before pulling him protectively into her arms. Obi-Wan welcomed the gesture for what it was: understanding. She knew his imposter syndrome better than most. Living up to a reputation of not just himself but his predecessors was a heavy task in peaceful times but worse during the war. It reared its head at the worst moments but if there was one thing Obi-Wan knew how to do, it was carry on in spite of that out of necessity.

“I can’t help but think the outcome would’ve been much worse had you not already been that better Jedi.”

His shoulders released a tension he didn’t know they were holding.

“Is it even worth asking you to be more careful?” she asked.

“If I were more careful, who would you bandage up in the middle of the night?”

“Oh, one of my other Jedi lovers I should think.”

There were so few completely peaceful moments in the galaxy, but this was one of them. Often, closing his eyes would force him to relive the explosions, the screams of “General!” or “Help!” haunting him, until he either passed out from exhaustion or the sun came up. As he closed his eyes now there was silence. Peaceful quiet surrounded him, interrupted only by Satine’s occasional humming.

Something about being protected, instead of being the protector, brought a calm to his mind that meditation hadn’t in quite some time. This room – Satine’s bedroom – was the only room in the galaxy he wasn’t on alert. It was a refuge, a place where they couldn’t be harmed or interrupted. Where they could share things no one else would ever know.

So as long as they were fishing for information from one another…

“How goes the political landscape of pacifism?”

“Why don’t you ask the question you actually want an answer to?”

“I… have always cared for Mandalore’s politics,” he protested unconvincingly.

“I’m sure. There have been no attempts on my life recently if that’s what you’re after.”

Obi-Wan couldn’t have hidden the smile on his face if he wanted to. On his journey to Mandalore, he was struck with the realization that so much time had passed since they last spoke that anything could have happened. Which meant maybe she did spend all that time missing him and maybe he should make that worth her while.

The urge to impress her made a sudden reappearance.

“Contrary to how I look, some of it was rather fun.”

“Fun?” she asked in a tone Obi-Wan interpreted as if you’re going to tell me how your violent adventures are fun then tread lightly.

“It’s not that the assignments are fun, mind you, but the energy between us makes me feel almost invincible. Believe it or not, Anakin has a way of making even the bleakest of situations bearable most of the time.”

“And the rest of the time?”

“The rest of the time he’s rather brash.”

“I wonder where he learned that?” she teased.

He rolled his eyes but didn’t respond. There were more than a few of Anakin’s traits the Jedi Council was less than fond of that Obi-Wan himself had passed on to his former padawan. Anakin often led with his heart instead of his head, a trait with which Obi-Wan was all too familiar. The difference was Anakin had yet to train himself out of that impulse. He rarely took time to clear his head and make rational decisions instead of emotional ones. A difficult lesson to learn and perhaps an even more difficult lesson to teach. Obi-Wan wasn’t even sure when he took that lesson to heart himself. A Jedi had to release his emotional attachments and commit to becoming one with the Force.

But if Obi-Wan truly let that part himself go, would he be in Satine’s room right now?

“Come on,” she said, and it pulled him from his contemplation. “As much as I’m looking forward to you playing house husband, I do have an early start tomorrow.”

Tomorrow. There was a promise of a tomorrow, several in fact, and that was the silver lining around yet another horrific war story. He quite liked the idea of being a Mandalorian house husband. It sounded uneventful. Peaceful and domestic. He could pretend there was no war for a few days, he was practiced at pretending.

He was a simple Jedi who lived a minimalist lifestyle, but if he was allowed one luxury on Coruscant it would be Satine’s bed. The poetic reason was preferable. If anyone were to ask, he could easily go on about how Satine’s bed had her in it and she was safety and home and love. How nothing felt as infinite and fleeting at the same time as their moments together. How nothing in the galaxy was as concrete as the part of himself devoted to Satine Kryze. All of that was true. But it was also just an exceptionally comfortable bed. The Jedi were not overly concerned with comfort in the temple, the Republic warships even less so, and he wasn’t in his own apartment enough to justify it. Though Satine would probably have one sent to Coruscant for him if he asked.

“So tell me, what does tomorrow have in store for the Duchess of Mandalore? And does it involve staying in this bed and nursing me back to health?”

“You’ll have to make a better offer if you want to compete with the thrill of politics.”

Obi-Wan cupped her cheek and brushed his thumb across her lips. She moved towards him instinctually and he took the opportunity to tangle his fingers in her hair and place his other hand on the small of her back. When he kissed her, it was always with the knowledge that nothing could compare to the sweetness of her lips or the soft noises he pulled from her that were indistinguishable between whimpers and his name. Whether rough or tender, worshiping at her altar required a reverence he did not take lightly. His lips knew every inch of hers like a well recited prayer and she kissed him back word for word. As he held her tight against him, Obi-Wan was sure being skin to skin wasn’t close enough.

Satine’s face was flushed when he pulled back somehow making her more beautiful and, god, how did he survive so long without her? Her eyes dared him to keep going and he almost gave in.

“How are my chances now?”

“I’ve had better.”

“Lying is not becoming of a duchess, you know.”

Her laugh was soft and had an innocence that reminded him of the first time he made her smile. About a week into his assignment as protector Satine had only shown a dead-eyed lack of emotion. He couldn’t blame her, not really, considering why he and Qui-Gon were assigned protection detail to begin with. But Obi-Wan never was a patient young man and for reasons he had yet to figure out, he desperately wanted to see her smile. One night she was staring at the sky, as she often did, and Obi-Wan joined her. They sat in silence, nothing more. Satine later told him anything she could smile through was survivable and, until that night, she wasn’t convinced she would.

As nice a memory as it was, a sharp pain brought him back to reality.  

“If the answer is no then you have to get off me.” He gently pushed her off his lap and she looked puzzled. “You’re leaning right into a very large bruise.”

She moved off him immediately, still giggling a little bit at his struggle. After declining his very generous offer of taking care of him all day she was finding humor in his injuries? He pouted as a plea for sympathy. It worked. She leaned down and tenderly pressed her lips to his bruise.

“Better?” she asked.

“Perfect.”

Clichés and cringe-worthy sentiments scrolled through his mind on repeat because no combination of words seemed appropriate for how exquisite he thought Satine looked. He never did learn enough Mando’a to express that either, but he suspected it wouldn’t satisfy him. Her hair was slightly messy, lips drawn wide into her gorgeous smile, and he was having great difficulty pulling his eyes away from the nightgown bunched at the top of her thighs. Yes, he could move through the pain.

“It seems such a shame to come all this way just for rest,” he said, voice heavy with implication. 

“I am of the opinion that you’re in no condition for anything except sleep. You were too sore for kissing not a moment ago.”

“I wasn’t in pain,” he said defensively. “I simply know when I’m fighting a losing battle.”

“Alright, alright. I’ll make a deal with you, Negotiator.” He braced himself. The butterflies in his stomach warned him he may be fighting a losing battle for the second time. “If you believe you’re fit for something so laborious, I’ll indulge you as long as you appear pain free.”

“Laborious? You make it sound like such a chore,” he replied with feigned offense.

“Oh, do not mistake my tone for lack of enthusiasm. There are few things I’d rather be doing.”

She motioned down her body as if to say Go ahead, I’m waiting. Obi-Wan swiftly pushed himself up and moved to hover just inches above Satine. She blushed at the sudden closeness, and he flashed her his signature cocky grin before kissing that one spot on her neck he knew made her gasp. Or that was his intention. In reality, his incredibly sore body put up a fight when he tried to sit up so suddenly and, instead of well executed seduction, he flopped back down with a groan. Satine, now leaning on one arm so she could look at him, wore an expression of great satisfaction on her face. Why did he ever bother taking charge? He would love to be right just once. 

“Now that you mention it, I’m rather exhausted anyway.” 

“Mhmm. How about this, as soon as you feel better, I’ll let you keep me in this bed as long as you want,” she offered, pushing stray hairs out of his eyes.

Despite the dull-ache running through his entire body no matter how he moved, Obi-Wan motioned for her to lay on his chest. Words of protest tumbled out of her mouth, but her body was already entangling itself with his. Her never-ending concern for him was sweet but some things were worth the pain. In this case, the twinges of pain from the wounds that painted his body couldn’t compare to the elation of her arm draped over his waist and his hand combing through her hair. 

A dangerous but fleeting thought of What about after the war? washed over him. It was not a question he could answer, nor one he wanted to dwell on just then. But comfort came in knowing Satine allowed him to imagine a time beyond the Clone Wars.

Chapter Text

“Obi-Wan,” Satine whispered. 

He didn’t move. How was he always such a sound sleeper? Satine couldn’t remember what it felt like to be well rested. 

Nights were as beautiful as they were terrifying. The galaxy was exquisite, even from the ground. In another life she could travel to all those stars. Meet the inhabitants of every planet. Befriend different species. She could have adventures, maybe even with Obi-Wan, in this alternate life free of responsibility. But that wasn’t her reality. Night brought silence. Every little sound made her jump. Just as she was about to doze off the wind would pick up or the leaves would rustle, or an animal would skitter by, and Satine was suddenly wide awake. 

“Obi,” she tried again. Nothing. He deserved his sleep, she supposed, but sometimes she couldn’t get to sleep without him. When Obi-Wan and Satine first met he accused her of being pampered and privileged and needing to be waited on hand and foot. A claim she vehemently denied. She was not spoiled! And yet in moments like this it became difficult to disagree. Satine wanted him and why shouldn’t a duchess have what she wants?

Slowly, Satine moved her hand towards him with the intention of gently poking his cheek when Obi-Wan’s hand shot up and grabbed her wrist.

“Don’t,” he said, eyes still shut.

“I can’t sleep.”

“So you decided to interrupt mine?” he asked, already turning to face Satine while wearing a sleepy smile. “What’s wrong?”

Suddenly shy, she just mumbled “frightened” and fixed her stare at the ground. It felt ridiculous to say it out loud. It wasn’t even a nightmare, just a bout of anxiety! Still, it seemed one of her shortcomings was asking for help and well… she was trying.

He took her hand and she took a deep breath.

“When I manage to fall asleep, I wake up screaming from nightmares. When I don’t, every little sound puts me on edge. Then I lie awake guiltily wishing I could be someone else doing anything else.”

“That’s not unreasonable.”

“Do you?”

“What?”

She finally looked him in the eyes. “Ever wish you could be somewhere else?”

Before he could answer Satine turned onto her back and started speaking again, realizing she didn’t want his answer. She liked him there, with her, despite everything.

“I would get on a ship and disembark wherever it landed,” she continued. “Then, wherever that is, I’d work. I don’t know what I’d do but I’d only need to do it long enough to get my own ship. After that I can go anywhere I want.”

It was a nice fantasy. No responsibility to anyone except herself and doing anything she wanted above all else. A few weeks on this planet, a few weeks on that planet. Not hearing blaster shots whenever she closed her eyes. Not with a warrant on her head for simply wanting peace. Not having the future of her entire planet in the hands of a teenager.

“It’s not a bad plan,” he said. “But I do have some notes.”

“Go on, then,” she replied with a dry laugh.

“First, how will you make sure you get on a ship that flies somewhere safe? Second, it would take an awful long time for just one person to earn that many credits. Third, please tell me you’re not planning on piloting this ship yourself.”

“Hmm, I suppose I’ll have to find some kind of guide. They’ll have to be well traveled. An interesting conversationalist, obviously. And, I suppose, it wouldn’t hurt if they could fly.”

“Yes, a decent pilot would be a start. Anything else?”

“Committed to their word,” she continued. “Brave. Handsome wouldn’t hurt, either.”

“If I may be so bold, this partner in crime sounds a lot like me.”

Satine turned to look at him again, pleased to find he still had that goofy grin on his face. Joy didn’t look as good on anyone as it did on Obi-Wan Kenobi, and she didn’t care how many bold or ludicrous claims he made. If he smiled because of her, at least amidst this disastrous chain of events she did something right.

“Who else?”

The words were so matter of fact she surprised even herself. It was the truth, though, wasn’t it? There was no one else she’d rather have by her side no matter the situation. If they did run away, not that she was suggesting they should run away, they would not get very far. They could avoid bounty hunters but probably not Qui-Gon Jinn. Speaking of the Jedi Master, Satine peered over Obi-Wan to check that Qui-Gon was asleep. He appeared to be asleep, but she also thought that when he was meditating. One day they were going to get caught whispering – or worse – and that embarrassment might kill her before any bounty hunter could. Luck was usually kind to her in these moments, though.

Satisfied she was in the clear, Satine leaned down and kissed Obi-Wan.

“What was that for?” he asked.

She shrugged. “For being my partner in crime.”

Chapter Text

Death Watch, Council of Neutral Systems, Republic, Separatist, Jedi Code, repeat. Every day. Satine urged him to sleep, as she always did, because he showed up haggard and fatigued. If Obi-Wan was peacefully asleep in her arms, he was safe. And while he lay in her arms, content, she stayed awake going over Mandalore’s future and navigating the safety of every citizen of every neutral planet. Obi-Wan was the king of compartmentalizing but, never one to discount her own skill, Satine was sure she could give him competition for the throne. He wasn’t the only one who needed a good night’s rest.

If she wasn’t sitting in meetings about trade routes or cleaning up after Death Watch she was being forced to put away members of her own government. Satine stopped stroking his arm for a moment to run her fingers across her neck. The discoloration from the shock collar had mostly faded but there was still the occasional twinge of phantom pain. If the request could have come without a flurry of follow-up questions, she would have asked Ahsoka to keep that detail out of her report (or at least far away from Obi-Wan). Instead, she received a frantic call in the middle of the night wondering if she was alright, if the Republic could be of any assistance, if he should come and follow up with the situation since the Jedi were directly involved. All questions he knew the answers to: yes, no, you’ll need to find a better excuse than that to come back to Mandalore. The last answer earned her that adoring smile and it was enough to make the whole ordeal fade away, at least for an evening.

She never let on, it was her job to remain calm under pressure, but Satine was scared. So much of her life was consumed by wars, none of them hers. Mandalore was barely a generation out of their civil war when the Republic came knocking to recruit them for another. The peace she’d been chasing her entire life always seemed just beyond her grasp. The truth was she could feel Mandalore slipping from her control but what else could she do? How could she keep getting up every day to fight what was starting to feel like a losing battle?

“What do I do?” she murmured.

She hadn’t meant to actually ask him, she meant to let him rest. Her own anxieties weren’t going anywhere and, therefore, she could find no good reason to interrupt his sleep.

“What’s wrong?”

Satine jumped at the sound of his voice.

“You were supposed to be asleep,” she said.

“I find it difficult to fall asleep before you do, old habits are hard to break,” he responded simply.

“What makes you think something’s wrong?”

“I’ve always been able to tell when something’s bothering you, my dear,” he said followed by a soft laugh. “Besides, even if I couldn’t, I can feel how fast your heart is pounding.”

There wasn’t really a point in trying to pretend nothing was wrong. He would know, he always knew. Sometimes he knew before Satine realized it herself.

“How did you do it?” she asked.

“Hmm?”

“How did you convince yourself to keep going?”

As soon as the question came out, she wished she could take it back. It felt too vulnerable, even with Obi-Wan. Besides, Satine knew the answer. She would always keep going for her people, despite the emotional toll, because if she didn’t fight for them no one would. She would wake up every day and perform her duties as Duchess of Mandalore and leader of the Council of Neutral Systems because so many had entrusted their livelihoods to her. The fire that she embodied as a young woman – the passion she felt towards implementing and committing to pacifism – still burned bright. Some days were just more exhausting to fan the flames.

He looked at her with pensive eyes. Almost melancholic, she thought. An expression with which she was well acquainted. And, so, when he answered her question with one of his own, she was unsurprised.

“Have you been sleeping?”

“Yes.”

“Satine.”

“Not well or often. But I do eventually fall asleep.”

He pushed himself up to sit and forced Satine out of the most comfortable and safest place she’d been in some time. Often, she took careful care of Obi-Wan because he took every experience, every moment, on the battlefield to heart (though he’d have everyone believe otherwise). However, the current state of Mandalore felt like uncharted territory. She’d been challenged her entire life and persevered through every difficulty. But something was different now. Something was coming. It plagued her every thought, and he could tell.

Their roles of caretaker and patient flipped from earlier in the evening and it made Satine feel like a teenager again. She took care of Obi-Wan not only because he needed it, but because he’d already done his protecting. Now, so many years later, she should have this all under control. Shouldn’t she?

“I kept going for the people that needed me to. For the people of Kiros. For Anakin and Ahsoka. For… you.”

Satine pressed her lips to his shoulder before resting her head on him. It was a concise explanation, just vague enough to be satisfactory and very Jedi in tone. In the end, persevering because her people needed her to was the answer. But it was not exactly the comfort she was chasing.

“I will admit,” he continued softly, “I let my mind wander. Every time, I went to the same little fantasy. A little home filled with flowers and photos and books on some forest planet. There’d be a market in the nearby town to visit and a cantina, but not a seedy one. Some place the war never touched.”

“Sounds too quiet, even for you.”

“Well, I am certain you would take care of that.”

“I’m there too?” she asked as if she didn’t know the answer.

“Who else?”

It came out so naturally, so sincere, that Satine was almost surprised. At a loss for how to respond, she leaned up and kissed his cheek. Sometimes she thought life would be easier if Obi-Wan stayed on Mandalore. Her imagination glossed over the parts where someone had to ask and they had to deal with the consequences. But the long term was fun to think about. Never again would she worry about surviving through the day. She’d always have someone to come home to who would listen to her ramble about her day.

The worst part was she always daydreamed about this life with him as the galaxy was now, amidst the Clone Wars. Her responsibility seeped so deep into her mind that even her little escapes weren’t really escapes.

“My point is,” he continued, “there’s no shame in pretending sometimes if it gets you through the day.”

Bold of him, the man who made a name out of carrying unwarranted guilt, to say there was no shame in escapism. But there was no use in saying the quiet part out loud because it always came back to Do as I say not as I do and Satine was not fond of receiving padawan-esque lectures. It was a nice image. Not the one she’d imagine for them, mind you, but nice.

“Fret not, I’ve done more than my share of pretending when you’re not around.”

“Then dwell on your daydreams of the future to make the present bearable.”

That was a bit fairytale, even for him. She could do that, though. Maybe she was thinking about it too hard. Satine tended to overthink when stressed and, unfortunately, she was having trouble remembering what it felt like being stress free.

But then there was that little voice in the back of her head wondering why Obi-Wan was half-naked in her bed and she wanted to focus on work.

“What you really want is to occupy my every thought while I wait for you to rescue me from… how did you phrase it? Pointless and mundane politics of neutrality?”

“I never said pointless!” he answered quickly. “I was very careful with my words. And maybe not your every thought. Just most of them.”

“I’ll try to fit you in between meetings.”

“That’s all I ask.”

Successful as ever at talking her off the ledge. For the first time since they reconnected, Satine realized, Obi-Wan would still be there the following night. And maybe even the one after that if the galaxy felt exceptionally kind.

As they lay down again, she took his advice. They were never able to play house before. He would be waiting for her when she returned home, perhaps with dinner ready or a story of something so monotonously domestic she would forget they were the Duchess and the Jedi and instead just two people devotedly, unfalteringly in love who decided to choose each other every day. Now that was a little fairytale, but no one had to know.

Soon, she drifted off to sleep.

Chapter Text

When Obi-Wan awoke the following morning, the bed was cold and empty. Not in a panicked and dread-inducing way, more of a pouty’ where did she go and when will she come back so I can hold her’ kind of way. He pushed himself up and took a survey of his surroundings. Data pad still on the nightstand, though Satine’s side of the bed was neatly done up. Breakfast was around somewhere, he could smell it, and decided finding food might be his best course of action. 

Drowsily, Obi-Wan followed his nose until he found exactly what he needed. Breakfast looked good too. 

“Morning, beautiful,” he said, leaning down to kiss Satine’s cheek. 

“Did I wake you? I wanted you to sleep. You need it.” 

“Not to worry, you didn’t wake me.” 

Even if she had, it wouldn’t have mattered. Obi-Wan didn’t sleep all that much. In fact, he probably got more sleep the previous night than he had in weeks, if not months. Certainly, he could use this time to recover and sleep a little more, but wouldn’t that be a waste? Besides, he had so much trouble falling asleep without Satine in his arms that his time was better used soaking up every moment of her existence. 

Something about the safety of her smile tore down every defense he’d spent the better part of two decades building. The one thing she asked, without ever saying a word, was that he check the distance between them at the door. With that block safely tucked away in the cargo hold on his ship, Obi-Wan’s mind cleared up space for more important things. Things like how Satine’s hair must be made of pure, shimmering gold and her eyes were flecked with stardust and her lips were the only thing worth tasting in the entire godforsaken galaxy. No one had gentler hands and no one had ever picked up this cracked and bruised version of Obi-Wan with the promise to mend him. 

“You should rest while you can,” Satine said in that tone that meant he wasn’t to argue with her. 

There was no rule against bargaining with her, however. 

“If I do return to bed, is there any way I can entice you to come with me?” 

Satine’s face scrunched up in consideration, and for a moment, he thought he might get his wish. Surely between work and spending the day in bed with him, Obi-Wan’s offer was the superior choice. She could take a sick day, couldn’t she? Duchesses needed time off as well. 

“Hmm, I don’t think so.” 

Damn. Worth a shot. 

“What are my orders today while you’re off saving the galaxy one peaceful negotiation at a time?” 

“Don’t make fun,” she tutted. 

“On my honor, I’m not.” 

“In that case, your orders are to stay out of trouble. No Jedi clothes, no lightsaber, no eavesdropping in the palace.” 

Ah. That. Visits to Mandalore were exceedingly rare. So rare, in fact, that this particular fight was twenty years old. He and Qui-Gon had stayed on Mandalore for a short time after the war ended, just to ensure a peaceful handover. But the end of their time running had meant Satine spending little to no time with him because, well, she’d properly become the duchess. So, like the infatuated teenager he was, Obi-Wan had found all the little hiding spots around the palace where he could hear her laying out her new government and plans for Mandalore’s future. She’d been good at it, too. Still was. But it had made for risky business the one time he was caught, and he never liked putting Satine in a tough spot. 

“I did that two, perhaps three times,” he argued. 

“You did it every day until you left,” she said fondly. Yes, he did. Of course he did. 

With a quick rundown of her (much to Obi-Wan’s chagrin) terribly packed schedule, Satine was out the door with little more than a kiss goodbye. That left him with an entire free day on Mandalore. He could do anything he wanted, as long as what he wanted involved staying as inconspicuous as possible. Endless possibilities! 

Obi-Wan started by meditating. No reason to disrupt his routine just because he was… disrupting his routine. 

Meditating went as well as it could, but he was hard-pressed to get Satine off his mind. The idea that this was his reality in some alternate timeline was playing far too close to his chest. But he shoved it down as best he could - there’d be plenty of time for guilt and remorse when he returned to Coruscant. 

Instead, he decided to do something unprecedented: have a normal, uneventful day. First things first! Clothing. He was forbidden from wearing his Jedi robes, so he looked in Satine’s wardrobe for the clothing she kept for him “just in case.” As he got dressed, he wondered if Satine might like him better draped in Mandalorian garb. It occurred to him that she’d only ever seen him in his Jedi attire (save a few makeshift outfits when they were teenagers). Perhaps he’d seek her opinion on that later. 

Logically, Obi-Wan knew nothing dangerous was going to happen because he left his lightsaber on Satine’s nightstand, but he felt naked without it. Sundari was just as busy as Coruscant, but it had a distinctly calmer atmosphere. Odd considering he’d witnessed an attack from Death Watch here not long ago, but that was an incredible testament to the community Satine had rebuilt. 

But what was that he told Satine the night prior? Pretending is alright if it gets you through the day?

Alright! He’d play househusband. In his deepest fantasies, the ones he scarcely admitted to even himself, that was his role. He was a fine leader and decision maker, an excellent negotiator if he did say so himself, but Obi-Wan longed for a quiet life. He had an infinitely long list of tasks and missions, but Ben’s only job was to be in love. 

As far as his day went, Obi-Wan was determined to keep his promise to stay off the grid. He was constantly impressed with just how far Mandalore had come in such a relatively short period of time, as far as building a planet from the ground up goes. There were parks and museums, markets and shops, and an undeniable sense of community around every corner. Not that Mandalore was a perfect society, but it was refreshing to live without the undercurrent of fear he sensed from most everyone his Jedi assignments had him interacting with. He ended up at the Peace Park. If Obi-Wan hadn’t borne witness himself, he wouldn’t believe a tragedy had taken place. Everything was in pristine condition, as though nothing had ever happened. It made it easier to pretend. 

Obi-Wan could see why Satine loved the park so much. It was bright and open and green, likely as green as a post-war Mandalore was going to get. During their time together as teenagers, nature was always something that connected Satine to home. She’d told him about the trees and the planets, asked if he thought she could dig up some pretty flowers they’d found and plant them when she finally went home. Even now, flora that even reminded Obi-Wan of Mandalore gave him pause. He always knew she’d stay with him forever, but he never expected to be laid out by a single lily. Yet here he stood, twenty-odd years later, having experienced the emotional turmoil a flower could bring more than a handful of times. Now, though, it’s different. Duty was still keeping them apart, but this time only for a matter of hours. 

As he approached the Memorial Shrine, the memories of that day came flooding back. The park had been cleaned up, but the Memorial Shrine had been left shattered. Satine had decided against fixing the shrine to prove a point. A warning, she’d said, against pointless violence. How violence brought nothing but destruction, how hate bred hate and anger bred anger. The statue looked out of place in the clean, modern park. Obi-Wan stroked his chin, trying to ascertain what strange feeling was bubbling up in his stomach the longer he stared. 

Then, it hit him. 

A Satine-related feeling he’d never been able to reconcile was how fleeting their relationship felt. When they were young, Obi-Wan had never been able to get the end out of his mind, try as he might. He’d wanted the war to end, of course he did, but that meant going from Satine and Obi-Wan to the Duchess and the Jedi. Now that they’d been given some semblance of a second chance, as secret and convoluted as it may be, the ever present reminder that they’d only have a handful of days or hours at a time returned. 

But right then, his gut realized what it should have years ago. The fleeting feeling would never disappear, but he need not wallow in it. Spending this time worrying about how he was going to say goodby was pointless. Violence bred violence, but cowardice bred cowardice. Which led to the only logical conclusion. 

Love fostered love. And, perhaps, being in love itself was the fragile thing that he never wanted to accept. He didn’t want to ruin it, he’d never try to ruin it, but he could ruin it. That fear kept Satine at arm’s length, but he should have been holding her as close as possible. 

That was how Obi-Wan found himself back in Satine’s kitchen, fighting for his life. 

Well, not quite so dramatic. The only Mandalorian snack he could remember Satine ever mentioning were Cassius tea cookies. Cassius tree flower seeds were difficult but not impossible to come by. He went to three markets before finding them. Now, he was staring down a batch of questionable looking cookies that were in no way fit for any duchess, let alone Satine. The color was uneven, the shapes were barely circle-adjacent, and the scent was not appetizing. They were, in a word, unsightly. 

As he wracked his brain for a solution, he heard the door to the apartment swish open. 

“Obi?” 

He hustled out to meet her, unable to keep the bright smile off his face. How lovely it was to be free to pick Satine up and kiss her without a second thought! 

“I trust you’ve had an uneventful day?” she asked. At least, he thought that was what she asked. Her words were muffled and cut off because Obi-Wan wouldn’t stop kissing her. 

“Dreadfully boring until this very moment,” he answered when he managed to pull his lips away from hers. 

“Why are you covered in flour?” She brushed his cheek, presumably wiping some flour away. 

Considering how they turned out, Obi-Wan was less than enthused about showing Satine his grand surprise. But maybe they were alright? He wasn’t sure how the cookies were supposed to look anyway, maybe he’d baked them correctly! 

“I wanted to do something nice for you.” Obi-Wan took her hand and pulled her to the kitchen. The cookies looked sadder than they had a few minutes ago. “I’m, ah, not sure that I succeeded.” 

“Are these Cassius tea cookies?” 

“They’re supposed to be.” 

Satine picked up a cookie and bit into it. No hesitation, no concern for how they looked. Waiting for the verdict felt like an eternity. He couldn’t read her face, so there was no telling if the cookies were good or bad. People didn’t break up over baked goods, right? 

“Well?” he asked, unable to wait any longer. The silence was driving him to madness. 

“You are a very sweet man, Obi-Wan Kenobi.” Satine leaned forward and kissed him, hard. The kind of kiss she employed when she wanted him to forget what they’d just been talking about. It made him chuckle. 

“That bad?” 

“I appreciate the thought. I love you.” 

“Even if I can’t bake?” Obi-Wan pulled her close so he could wrap and arm around her waist. 

“It’s a tough decision, but I think I’ll keep you around in spite of that.” 

When they sat down to dinner, it was the first time in hours Obi-Wan had stopped to relax. As much as he’d been enjoying this domestic bliss, his body needed more than a day to recover from the entire ordeal on Kadavo. Pushing himself to be physical all day wasn’t the best idea he’d ever had, especially considering the plans he had for their evening. He kept the grunting to a minimum, tried not to contort his face in pain, and made it a point to stare lovingly at Satine because, after all, that was the point. If Satine noticed, she said nothing. He wanted that to be a good sign, but he knew better. She was biding her time to bring it up at just the right moment. 

They cleaned up, moved to the sofa, and talked about their days. Obi-Wan took an unusually deep breath as he sat down, but cleverly turned it into a wistful sigh and a compliment about how beautiful Satine looked. She rolled her eyes, as she often did, but leaned onto his shoulder. As she briefed him on her day of meetings, he combed his fingers through her hair and kissed the top of her head. As he told her about his day of sightseeing, she traced shapes on his thigh and reached up to kiss his jaw. 

“Sounds like you had quite the day,” he commented. “Did you find any time to miss me?” 

“Oh, once or twice,” she teased. 

“I’ve missed you,” he said softly, and he didn’t just mean today. They’ve had a handful of stolen moments since being reunited, and all that did was bring the crushing weight of two decades without her to the forefront of his mind. He wanted to soak up every bit of wasted time and transform it into new memories, happy memories that could lull him to sleep during the lonely nights he’d be returning to in a few days. 

Satine, masterfully fluent in Obi-Wan Kenobi, straddled his lap and wrapped her arms around his neck. Instinctively, like they belonged there, his arms came to her waist. 

“I always miss you,” she admitted. “I spent the entire day willing time to move faster so I could come home to you.” 

Home. The first time Satine referred to Obi-Wan as home, they’d known each other for three months. She’d started having nightmares, and he’d stopped sleeping for more than a few non-consecutive hours a night. If Satine was going to wake up screaming, Obi-Wan was going to be awake to make it alright. ‘I’m going to make sure you get to go home,’ he’d promised after a particularly rough one. She’d shaken her head, laid down on his chest, and murmured sleepily, ‘I feel like I’m home with you.’ And Obi-Wan’s head had just about exploded, so it was a lucky thing she’d fallen back asleep without seeing the blush creep onto his face. 

Obi-Wan took her face in his hands and kissed her again with all the tender affection he could summon. She would always be home to him, the one constant in his life even when she wasn’t. No matter how much the Jedi Order shifted into chaos, no matter what trouble Anakin got them into, Satine was always out in the galaxy being who she always was. 

Gentle kisses turned heated and hands began to wander. Satine pulled him into her just a little too hard, and Obi-Wan groaned in pain. 

“Sorry, are you alright?” She sounded worried. And maybe she had every right to be worried, but no amount of soreness was going to stop him. 

“I’m fine,” he insisted, pulling her close again. 

“You’re not! And you won’t be for some time after what you went through.” 

“Satine,” he said firmly. Now it was his turn to make sure there was no room for argument. Usually, he’d be happy to concede to whatever she wanted. But this wasn’t just about sex. Intimacy was a craving Obi-Wan couldn’t curb. “I’ve been worse. I’ll be fine.” 

“You certainly know how to reassure a woman.” 

Too much talk, not enough action. He braced himself - it was going to hurt, no matter how determined he was to fight through it - and flipped them around so Satine was on the sofa and Obi-Wan was lowering himself to his knees. He pushed up just enough to capture her lips, her jaw, her neck. Practice was few and far between, but his muscle memory knew just how to make her gasp. Regrettably, he knew he couldn’t mark her, but god they both wanted it. 

“Why don’t I prove to you just how alright I am, hmm?” Obi-Wan bunched her skirts up at her waist and said, “Hold this for me.” 

Satine did as he asked, letting out some words very unbecoming of a duchess. Something raw and wanton had taken over him, and he was consumed with a fierce determination to see just how far he could push her before being reprimanded over volume control. He had no idea what came over him, but Obi-Wan removed her undergarments with his teeth, dragging them down her body just so he could kiss his way back up. He lifted her left leg up, trailing kisses from her ankle up to her thigh. Here, because he was unable to help himself, Obi-Wan sucked a small mark just to prove he was there. 

“You’re so…” Satine trailed off as his mouth went back to work. Why shouldn’t he make a second mark or a third? Because no matter what the public state of their relationship was, they belonged to one another. 

“It’s a little early for you to be at a loss for words, my dear,” he teased. 

“How do I ever let you leave?” 

“Because you have a strength I’ve never had.” 

Obi-Wan hooked his arms under her thighs and pulled her forward, pressing a kiss to her hip.

“There are few places I’d rather be than on my knees for you,” he continued. “Royalty should be treated as such.” 

Nothing compared to the taste of her. He always liked the somewhat frantic nature of using his hands, and few things kept him up in the middle of the night like being inside her, because that came with scratches down his back and marks on his collarbone and galaxies born behind his eyes all its own. But this? Satine always always said his mouth must be able to serve some better purpose than arguing with her. Eventually, he found that higher purpose. 

If Satine was royalty, this was how Obi-Wan chose to pay his respects. With one of her legs held to the side and the other held tight around the thigh as he put it over his shoulder, Obi-Wan found his capacity for teasing at an all-time low. A side-effect of only being allowed such a luxury on rare occasions, he presumed. As a ravenous hunger bloomed in his chest, his eyes flickered up to Satine once again. Her eyes were mildly glazed over, but soft. She dropped her dress with one hand in favor of cupping his face. He leaned into her touch; always warm, always welcome. 

And Satine looked at him with something else, a stare that dared Obi-Wan to just get on with what he intended to do (that was, make her come so hard he rendered her muscles useless and had to carry her to bed). He brought her hand to his lips and kissed her palm before placing it over his heart. If the angle would allow for it, he’d keep her hand there so she knew just how much he meant that silent ‘I love you.’ But, alas, as he shifted down lower, Satine’s hand settled in his hair instead. 

Obi-Wan started slow, because he knew she’d be impatient. Even with his tongue inside her, Satine never could resist a bit of playful bickering. This is not what the Jedi had in mind when they taught him how to practice patience, but all the better for Satine that this was how he chose to employ such a skillset. Because he could very easily get carried away, could feel the bone-deep desire begging to be set free. 

“Maybe I’ll keep you here,” she gasped. “If this is what I come home to every day.” 

He hummed, happy for this to be his life. The hand in his hair pulled tightly as his tongue swirled particularly wickedly. 

“Why wait until you get home?” he asked, pulling back for a fraction of a second before continuing. She’d acknowledge that question when it caught up to her, but for now, soft moans we’re eking their way out despite her lips being pressed together. 

“What -“ Satine cut herself off with a moan she’d clearly been trying to stifle. “What do you mean?” 

“Do you know what one of my favorite things about you is?” 

In lieu of an answer, she rolled her hips up towards his face. As he suspected. Maybe he was in the mood for teasing. Obi-Wan let his fingers do the work, slowly trailing them up and down, just enough to keep her breathing erratic, as he waited for an answer to his question. 

“No.” A short answer was still an answer, because as much fun as it would be to make her wait and beg, Obi-Wan himself couldn’t resist giving Satine what she wanted. 

“Your voice,” he told her. Beneath his other hand, he could feel her trembling slightly. “I hear you sometimes in my dreams, and when I’m alone.” He emphasized the last word and pressed a kiss to her thigh before taking her leg off his shoulder. He heard half a protest leave Satine’s mouth, but she quickly swallowed it when he started removing his shirt.  

“Alone?” she asked, single words seemingly all she could summon. 

Obi-Wan perched her leg back over him, reveling in the warmth of skin on skin, put his fingers back to work, and kept talking. “Just because I have exceedingly skilled self-control doesn’t mean I use it.” 

“Obviously.” Satine said it with a knowing laugh, low and dazed and hot. 

“So if your voice permeates my senses when I’m alone, if a memory can control me,” Obi-Wan stopped his light stroking and dipped his fingers inside her, “imagine how I feel when we’re together.” 

This fantasy had only come to him in the last thirty seconds, but he wanted it. Even just being out here in her living room made him feel deliciously exposed, but he craved more. This game of house they were playing emboldened him in unimaginable ways. Being together for the sake of it was such a new pleasure that it made Obi-Wan greedy. Unbecoming of a Jedi, but perfectly in character for Ben. 

She gasped when he put his mouth back on her, and Obi-Wan lavished in the way she reacted. Lightsabers and blasters and battle droids dissipated into nothing. There was only soft skin and softer whimpers, insistent hips and demanding fingers positioning him exactly where Satine wanted him. 

He decided to have it both ways, hurrying out the words in short, intermittent bursts when he needed her to calm down. 

“Did you know there’s just enough room at the top of the stairs leading to your thone for me comfortably kneel?” 

“No,” she answered breathily.

“I’d serve my station well,” he promised, kissing the scar on her hip. “Happy to be at the beck and call of the Duchess of Mandalore.” 

Faster, harder, nails digging into flesh - until Satine’s breathing became too labored. Then, back to soft, gentle, not quite enough. 

“You’d be a vision, sitting on your throne in that lace thing I found this morning bunched up around your waist.” 

“And where would you be?” Satine asked. He was impressed with her ability to regain enough composure to form a sentence. She never did enjoy letting Obi-Wan win, even when his gain was her gain doubled.

“Wherever your highness demands, of couse.” God, she really was beautiful. Her cheeks were lightly flushed, her dress was slipping off her shoulder, and she had this irreplicable mix of lust and adoration in her eyes. “But I think I’d like to be right here.” 

He could do this forever, drag her to the edge and back just to prolong the ecstasy. Even after so much time apart, Obi-Wan didn’t need the Force to read Satine. It came as second nature. The subtle differences in her breathing, how she shifted her body, if she breathed his name with an uptick at the end, or if she couldn’t get his name out at all. 

It could’ve been minutes or hours later when Satine made a point of trapping him with both of her legs, and those toned thighs on either side of his head, shaking and flexing, would be such a heavenly way to die. 

“Alright,” he chuckled quietly, “As you wish.” 

Satine let out a blissful sigh of thanks.

“So your voice,” he said, growing impatient himself. “Think how gorgeous your voice would sound echoing around your throne room.” 

“I’ve heard my voice booming around that room enough.” 

“Peace talks.” He rolled his eyes. “I mean that desperate voice you only use around me.”

She tilted her head back and bit her bottom lip, clearly stifling whatever reaction that little comment brought out. “You just want the ego boost,” she said to the ceiling.

“I do believe this is ego boost enough.” 

Satine did not disappoint - as if she were even capable of such a thing. He followed her every instruction to the letter (faster, more, like that), until he was certain he’d have a headache from how tightly her legs were wrapped around him. A small price for Obi-Wan to pay to have the absolute honor of watching this goddess of a woman come apart in his mouth and beneath his fingers, shooting pure infatuation straight into his heart. She gave him the satisfaction of gasping his name as she came. Obi-Wan dragged it out for as long as he could, allowing her to float through blissed out clouds for as long as she could until she began to shift uncomfortably. 

She tried twice to say something and then gave up, opting to pull Obi-Wan up from the floor and kiss him senseless instead. 

“Up to your royal standards?” he joked. 

“Exceeds them, as per usual. You’ve set a new bar.” 

“Let me know when you’ve recovered and we’ll see if I can’t top myself.” 

Obi-Wan did make good on that promise. They lay intertwined on the side for some time, kissing and laughing and paying each other sickeningly sweet compliments. She gave him an out, reminded him that he’d been more than generous with his talents, but Obi-Wan was insatiable when it came to Satine. She giggled as he hauled her up and positioned her over his face. There wasn’t nearly as much back and forth, nor was the build up anything beyond lazy and romantic. But she still sighed, still breathed his name like a prayer, and still wrapped herself up in his arms afterwards like he might disappear. Like she didn’t know that everything he did was an act of devotion. 

“If I can ever move again,” she began, still catching her breath, “I’m going to make you sound twice as desperate as I ever did.” 

“Don’t make promises you can’t keep.” 

Satine shut him up with a kiss, but Obi-Wan had no doubts that he’d be exhausted come tomorrow.

Chapter Text

Satine really should’ve told him no considering the extent of his injuries, but Obi-Wan had looked at her with such pleading eyes that she couldn’t summon the strength. She sat astride his lap while he leaned against the headboard, both of their chests heaving and lips locked together. Admittedly, it had taken several tries to find a position that didn’t make Obi-Wan groan with pain. Determined as he was, Satine had no intention of prolonging his injuries in the name of sex. It wasn’t that important (though it was insanely good). In this position, with his only job being to grip her hips tight and let his mouth roam free, Satine had made good on her promise to make him sound desperate. She wasn’t normally one to gloat, but who could resist when the great Obi-Wan Kenobi was whining and begging at her touch? 

“I don’t like seeing you covered in so many bruises,” she mentioned offhandedly as he kissed a line along her collarbone. “You must be in pain.” 

“It’s difficult to feel pain when I’m with you.” 

She rolled her eyes at such obscenely saccharine flattery. “I bet you say that to all your duchesses.” 

“Only the blonde ones,” he hummed in response. 

Of all their bits and jokes, that was the most common. ‘One of my other Jedi lovers’ or ‘must be another duchess’ or some variation of the like. Satine never thought too hard about them or how long ago they started, because they were just another way to cope. It wasn’t that she enjoyed pretending they were both seeing other people, but sometimes it made the separation a little easier, in some probably unhealthy and incredibly distant way. Satine loved him, she loved him, but lovesickness did not a good leader make, especially when the cause of said affection was often on every planet except for hers. A bit of distance would always be required, even when there was barely a hair’s breadth between them. But there was never anyone else for Satine. 

“You’ve always worried about me far too much,” he said softly, brushing his knuckles along her cheek. 

“Then you should be used to it by now.” She kissed him once, twice, and then several more times to ensure he understood the extent to which she loved him. 

Satine dragged him out of bed (gently, of course) and combated his protests with the promise of letting him join her in the shower. They moved from her bedroom with some effort as Obi-Wan insisted on keeping his arms wrapped around her from behind. He hummed pleasantly while she washed his hair, she let him kiss her as he pleased, and Satine allowed her mind to wander. They got out of the shower and wrapped themselves in towels, playfully fought over sink space while going through the rest of their nighttime routine, and Satine allowed her mind to wander further. She dressed them both in pajamas, Obi-Wan’s arms were suddenly weak and useless, and then he carried her to bed as his muscles miraculously recovered. 

So much of their time spent together was like this, horizontal and shrouded in darkness. It felt different when he didn’t come and go by moonlight but instead moved from day to night with her. 

“I like coming home to you,” she said once they’d settled into bed. 

“I like you coming home to me.” 

Obi-Wan’s eyes fluttered shut as Satine ran her fingers through his hair. It was fascinating, she thought, how so much had changed, and yet, he was still the same. Well, Ben was still the same. Obi-Wan was a force of nature, though he only chose to acknowledge it when necessary. She had her own reservations about the Jedi, how could she not, but he exemplified the best of the Order. Ben, however, was a cocky, smitten man without an ounce of shame in him when it came to Satine’s affections. He shuffled closer and snuck a hand under her nightgown, trailing his hand up and down her back. 

The biggest lie Satine told herself was that she didn’t miss the intimacy when Obi-Wan was gone. 

“May I ruin the moment?” she asked softly, and he hummed. 

“You won’t ruin it.” 

“I wish I could come home to you every night.” 

Rarely had Satine indulged in such fantasies, but it was true. She felt her face become hot, surely flushing red at such an admission. Not out of embarrassment, per se, but of rarely practiced vulnerability. It made her feel sixteen again, wishing for things she couldn’t have. The urge to backtrack was instantaneous, because the last thing she wanted was for a fresh layer of guilt to paint her Jedi when he let her confession eat away at him, as he was wont to do. 

For a moment, Obi-Wan fixed her with an unreadable gaze. That, too, was an uncommon occurrence. As a rule, he did not use the Force on Satine in any capacity, save life or death situations. But that made his ability to conceal his emotions from her all the more impressive. She never did learn that skill herself. 

Obi-Wan kissed her then, fiercely and forcefully and in such a manner that he’d finally done the impossible in stealing the breath from her lungs. Satine let him lead the way as he turned her on her back and pressed her down into the mattress. When he finally pulled away, she looked up at him with wide eyes and a heaving chest. 

“I wish I could give that to you, Satine.” 

A gentle energy passed between them, bittersweet but understanding. She did come home to him every night, in a way. Their visits may have been few and far between, but any half-observant visitor to her home would assume it housed two residents. One of his robes hung on her bedpost. She always set out two mugs for tea, just in case. The wardrobe had dedicated space for men’s clothing, there were two sets of towels in the bathroom, her dresser was littered with trinkets from different planets in far-off systems. He gave her as much of that life as he could. 

“Forget I said anything,” Satine told him, running her thumb over his bottom lip. 

“We can talk about it.” 

“I don’t need to,” she said honestly. “Just something about seeing you in the dark. But you’re here now, and you’ll be here tomorrow.” 

”But will you be here tomorrow?” Obi-Wan asked pointedly, easily switching up the tone of their conversation. 

“Missed me today, did you?” 

“Always,” he replied with a near-inaudible undertone of a whine. 

In lieu of an answer, Satine draped her arm around his neck and pulled him down. The least she could do for the man was kiss him senseless after such a long, arduous day alone. Obi-Wan always kissed her like he’d never have the chance again, like he was committing her to memory. As a result, Satine was left breathless and panting every time. 

“Better?” she asked, pressing one more quick kiss to his cheek. 

Obi-Wan dropped down next to her, and they lay facing each other once more. Even hidden in the shadows, he was so handsome. She’d recognize the lines of him anywhere, even in pitch black, because Satine had developed that skill to perfection when she was a teenager. So she could tell that he was observing her with love in his eyes and a silent question hanging from his parted lips. 

“I can’t disappear for an entire day,” Satine insisted. 

“I know,” he sighed dejectedly. “Just reminding you that the offer always stands. I miss spending every moment of the day with you.” 

Satine hummed, thinking it over. “You’d rather we were sixteen again,” she concluded. 

“If that’s what it takes.” Obi-Wan threaded his fingers through her hair and played with it, making Satine tingle pleasantly. “Is it such a crime on Mandalore to seek an extended audience with the duchess?” 

Whatever effect Obi-Wan had on Satine that made her willing to bend the rigid rules they’d put in place was seeping into her bones again. Catastrophic consequences and risk factors be damned. She could be selfish for one day. 

“As a matter of fact, it is,” Satine joked, shuffling closer to him. “However, I could be persuaded to make an exception.” 

Obi-Wan hooked a leg over her hip and kissed her softly, slowly. His lips moved with firm intention, the kind of slow, methodical make out that raised her blood pressure and stole the very air from her lungs. By the time he pulled back, Satine was panting and starry-eyed and so, so tired of fighting decorum. 

“I have several other arguments prepared.”  

“Save them, I’m sure you’ll want something else from me in the future,” Satine countered with a serene smile as a solution popped into her head. 

It was a risky idea, but so was hiding a Jedi in her bedroom. He’d been sent to Mandalore once before, who was to say the Jedi Council wouldn’t send him again? Besides, Obi-Wan was incredibly perceptive, he wouldn’t do anything to jeopardize Satine or her position as duchess. All Satine would have to do was act a smidgen put out that she had a Jedi observing her every move. A small price to pay to have Obi-Wan by her side all day.

She presented this ill-advised plan to him, and he was unsurprisingly enthusiastic.

“Think you can behave yourself?” she asked playfully. 

“No,” Obi-Wan replied, a sinful smile on his face. 

After a brief conversation about logistics for the following day, Satine settled in to sleep with the comforting weight of a Jedi Master on top of her. She drew mindless patterns on his back with one hand and ran the other through his hair. There were perhaps a handful of times that Satine could remember Obi-Wan falling asleep before her, and she added another tally mark to that small count. He was always her protector, still strived to be, but Satine considered herself Obi-Wan’s protector in turn. Him falling asleep first felt like a small victory, like she’d made him feel safe enough to let his guard down. She followed him soon after, drifting off into a peaceful sleep. 

The following morning, Satine was never more sure that Obi-Wan meant what he said about not behaving himself. After a very valiant effort to keep her in bed, he insisted on helping Satine get dressed as a flimsy excuse to have his hands linger on the curves of her body. He then dressed in his own robes, purposely askew so Satine would adjust them. It should surprise precisely no one that Obi-Wan Kenobi loved being fussed over, she thought. They chatted lightly over breakfast, the way a couple who spend every day together might - nothing to report except that Obi-Wan seemed to have his full appetite back and that Satine was beautiful, that Obi-Wan needed to get it out of his system before they went about their day and that he would never get Satine out of his system. 

“Kiss me,” Satine demanded firmly as they stood in the entryway. 

“If you insist,” Obi-Wan said suggestively, leaning in. 

“Wait.” She held him by the jaw, and his shoulders slumped as he groaned. “Kiss me with the understanding that you won’t get to kiss me again until we’re back in this room.” 

He pouted, an incredible visage in his Jedi attire, and kissed her deeply - enough to make her wonder which of them this would be more difficult for when he pulled back. 

They started out strong. Everyone seemed to find it reasonable that Obi-Wan would be sent back to Mandalore for another visit after what had happened in the Senate, and he sold the Jedi Council’s concerns very well. For her part, Satine was well-practiced at pretending she liked him at arm’s length and a few paces behind her. 

The day was packed front to back, as most of them were, so luckily there was precious little time to daydream about what they could be doing instead. However, that didn’t seem to stop Obi-Wan from committing to misbehaving. It was all quite subtle and easy for Satine to ignore, but she did notice. A hand on her lower back if they were walking a group, showing off just a little too much in a conversation, making obscenely terrible but harmless suggestions just to get her riled up. The latter worked quite well, but was brushed off without a second thought (most of the time, but he would pay for that later). 

She broke before lunch.

During a particularly arduous meeting filled with nothing but loud arguing and Satine massaging her temples, she called a twenty minute recess. She stepped just outside the hall into the corridor and walked past several windows before choosing a windowsill to lean on. Not fifteen seconds after she’d parted the curtains and pushed open the windows were the curtains drawn shut again. On any normal day, this would have frightened her. Today, however, the arms wrapping themselves around her waist startled her for a moment but nothing more. 

“What’s wrong with you?!” she whisper-yelled, turning around in Obi-Wan’s arms. 

“There’s no one around,” he whispered back. “Besides, I pulled the curtains shut.” 

Like pulling the curtains shut in a public corridor in the middle of a day would stop someone from catching a Jedi Master and the Duchess of Mandalore from being caught. Infuriating, reckless, and so, so charming. 

“This is too dangerous!” Satine insisted. “We’re going to get caught.” 

“I thought this was an invitation.” 

“You did not!” 

“Then why did you pick this window?” 

Obi-Wan sounded genuinely confused. Had Satine bade him follow her without realizing it? No, surely not. She was the sensible one. 

“What are you talking about?” 

His eyes flickered to the edge of the windowsill, so she followed his gaze. 

There, where the sill and the wall met, was a small and crudely carved symbol. A little heart that contained “SK + BK” within it. Satine had forgotten it was there. 

“You knew exactly what window this was?” 

“Of course,” he said matter-of-factly. “It’s my second favorite window on Mandalore.” 

“Because…” She relented and wrapped her arms around his neck. 

“It comes second to your bedroom window, because you are on the other side of it.” 

Truthfully, Obi-Wan always was going to get his way today if he really wanted it. Damn his starry eyes and ability to make every little thing romantic. 

“Fine,” she said with a sigh. “But there can be absolutely no evidence.” 

Obi-Wan nodded, already leaning it. The balance was difficult, what with his affinity for kissing her roughly and knocking her off balance (all in the name of catching her and holding her close). But in about 17 minutes, Satine had to return to the politics of diplomacy looking proper and her headdress was perfectly balanced, so he’d have to control himself. 

The kisses were soft and slow, deep and passionate in a way Obi-Wan hadn’t kissed Satine since they were teenagers. Except now, oh, now he was much more confident with his lips and his hands and his everything. 

“I have to go back,” Satine said about ten minutes later, regrettably pushing him off her lips. 

“There’s still time,” he complained, kissing her again. 

“Just a few more hours and you’ll have me all to yourself again!” Alright, it was more like five or six hours at best, and judging by his wounded eyes, Obi-Wan knew it. “Alright, one more, but then you really have to behave for the rest of the day.” 

“I swear it.” 

Satine should’ve checked for crossed fingers, but she didn’t. It was more fun this way. She kissed him once more, then quietly ducked out from behind the curtain and returned to her meeting.

Chapter Text

“Duchess?” 

Obi-Wan turned the corner at lightspeed, pulling Satine behind him as they both laughed. 

“Duchess!” 

The advisors’ voices echoed around the halls of the palace, but they’d never find the duchess if Obi-Wan had anything to say about it. Rarely had he let himself indulge in his affections for her so unseriously, but, while most days he was a Jedi padawan and the protector of the Duchess of Mandalore, he was also a teenager in love and counting down the seconds until that would be ripped away from him. So, when Satine had come knocking on his door and asked him to save her from the dreadful boredom of her morning meeting, he allowed himself to just be a boy in love with a girl. 

“Wait, this way!” Satine urged, dragging him down a different corridor. 

His smile was so wide that his face could barely contain the joy. The clicking of their shoes against the marble echoed off the walls as they sprinted in time with the speedy, rhythmic pounding of his heart. 

“In here!” 

Satine pulled him behind some curtains covering one of the grandiose windows. 

“Why here?” he whispered. 

“Curtains touch the floor to hide our feet, and they’ll muffle our voices,” she answered coolly. 

“Makes sense.” 

“And I can do this.” 

Obi-Wan had nearly formed a question in his mind, but it never made it to his lips because Satine had pressed hers against them. Far be it from Obi-Wan to argue with her (at least when it came to this). 

Kissing her was his favorite hobby, very nearly his purpose in life. The only time he felt anything even remotely akin to the sense of overwhelming comfort the Force gave him was when his arms were wrapped around her body. They never really gave each other enough time to find a proper rhythm, he thought maybe they were both just too excited to be together. 

“I love you,” she sighed happily. Satine told him she loved him two ways: solemnly and airly. The first was for after battle, when he calmed her down from nightmares, and the like. The latter came in their stolen moments, when she just couldn’t keep it in (or so she said). 

Obi-Wan kissed her again, reveling in the way she fisted her hands in his tunic to pull him impossibly closer. 

“How many meetings am I getting you out of today?” 

“Just the one,” she said through her barrage of kisses. 

Obi-Wan hummed in disbelief. 

“Okay, two? Or three?” Satine looked at him with those big eyes, the ones that got him to do anything she asked. 

They’d almost definitely be hearing about this later from all the adults involved. It didn’t suit them to run off and play like children, though children they were, because they had adult responsibilities. Qui-Gon would give the most reasoned lecture, surely, but he was the only one who knew the true nature of Obi-Wan and Satine’s relationship. The Mandalorians surely saw him as a formerly helpful but now inane distraction to their duchess. 

“You just think it’s funny when I get in trouble,” he accused lightly. 

“I do not!” Satine wrapped her arms around his waist and squeezed. “I only think it’s funny when you get into trouble for eavesdropping because you miss the sound of my voice.” 

Obi-Wan sputtered out a half-hearted denial at that. He did not! He was just very interested in, uh, politics. And it was difficult to meditate when she wasn’t there to try and interrupt his meditation! Nothing more, nothing less. 

“Alright, then I won’t do it anymore.” 

“No! I like when you do,” Satine admitted. “That way I know you’re there. I can’t just sense your presence through the Force like some people.” 

And again, like he’d done for the past year and would do for the rest of his life, Obi-Wan Kenobi decided to give Satine Kryze whatever she wanted. 

Just then, they heard footsteps clicking down the hallway. Obi-Wan held Satine close to his chest as they both attempted to stifle laughter and the sound of their breathing simultaneously. It was easy enough for the first minute or so, but as whoever it was approached their window, Satine decided to utilize her proximity to his neck. The problems with this were twofold. First, they did need to remain quiet. Second, he did not want to explain a precariously placed mark to his Master. 

Obi-Wan endured until the footsteps faded into the distance and around another corner, thinking that truly no man had ever suffered as he did (and what a heavenly torture it was). 

“Do the people of Mandalore know their duchess is such a troublemaker?” 

“I only make trouble where you’re concerned,” Satine replied, kissing his lips quickly. “Besides, you’re one to talk.” 

“I have never -” Satine pulled the high collar of her dress down to reveal a partially-faded hickey. “Alright, fair enough.” 

“You keep me in these high necklines despite the heat, I hope you’re proud of yourself.” 

He was. 

“I wish we could do this every day,” she continued, a little wistful and a little sad. 

“Tell you what, this will be our spot. And whenever you miss me, you can come here.” 

Satine rolled her eyes. “It’s just a window, Ben,” she said, like that was an obvious fact that he’d missed, and dramatically dropped her forehead onto his chest. 

Then, Obi-Wan did something so terribly out of character that it may have been the most true-to-self choice he’d made in a long time. 

He plucked one of the pins from her hair and started scratching at the windowsill. Satine perked up to see what he was doing. Obi-Wan scratched a very sloppy looking ‘BK’ into the wood before handing the hairpin to Satine. She grabbed it, a huge smile spreading across her face, and wrote ‘SK +’ next to his before putting a heart around the letters. 

“Now it’s our spot,” he confirmed. 

“I love you,” she said brightly, and Obi-Wan put her hand over his heart. 

“Obi-Wan!” called Qui-Gon from far too close a range. 

They stared at each other wide-eyed, knowing their little escape had finally come to an end. Mandalorian government officials were easy to avoid, but a Master Jedi was not. 

That didn’t mean they couldn’t try. 

“Run!” Obi-Wan said, grabbing Satine’s hand and bolting in the opposite direction of his mentor’s voice.