Chapter Text
“So…what’s your story?” She was the kind of beautiful only money could buy. The kind of person Kantor never had a reason to talk to. His voice caught in his throat a little, but he’d never let it carry all the way into his expression. She saw his silence and tried to strike up conversation. “I haven’t seen you at one of these parties before…where are you from?”
Kantor found his footing quickly enough this time. He was usually quick on his feet. If he wasn’t, he’d be dead by now. “Oh, me? I was a Jedi. You know, before the purge. I washed out though. Couldn’t hack it. So now I just kind of drift wherever the winds take me.” Actually entirely true, except for the not hacking it part. Kantor had fought for six years in the clone wars. He could have easily passed his trials…he chose not to.
Her face scrunched up unpleasantly. “What?” The Jedi were deeply unpopular. People didn’t mention them much. Not even in jokes.
“I’m Moff Hircsh’s stepson. My mother invited me to stay with them for a bit.” This was also true. Kantor wouldn’t describe himself as having a close relationship with his mother. He wouldn’t even really describe his link to her as a relationship at all. They had met a few times when he was a teenager, always under strange and unexpected circumstances.
“Oh.” Her face completely fell at that point. She starts drifting in a different direction. “I have friends that…goodbye.”
“Yeah. You have a great night.” Clearly, she didn’t want to get to know the stepchild with the uncomfortable sense of humor, and since Kantor didn’t want people to get to know him in general, this was a decent compromise in his opinion. Kantor turned and wandered deeper into the crowd. Crowds were always a great place to be alone, and for the first time he could remember he felt safe enough to not be connected to everything around him. He was never completely disconnected of course, he couldn’t be. That was a curse the Jedi had laid on him a long time ago. He could feel every person around him. He could let the cacophony of feeling press against him as he wove deeper through the press of humanity and human adjacents. Random hopes, random aspirations, random lies and panicked omissions. People were wonderful when you weren’t counting on them. Kantor was cursed though. He already knew that he’d enjoy this moment for only another 2 seconds before –
“Hey, weirdo. Father wants you.” Kantor had inherited 3 stepsisters when he came here, along with a stepfather, and he knew all of them just slightly less than the mother who’d welcomed him with open arms. The stepfamily were distinctly average people, which was Kantor’s favorite kind. This sister was the middle child, just at the edge of finishing school and considering university. Her name was Vanna, and she didn’t pretend to understand Kantor, but she was friendly enough about it.
“Sure. Is he inside the…” Kantor craned his neck up at the massive structure in front of them. It was an ominous black expanse, reaching to the sky and blotting out the sun.
“The house? Yeah.” Vanna rolled her eyes. “Do you want me to lead you to him?”
“Only if you want me to find him tonight….” The mansion was a maze by design.
She clucked her tongue but turned on heel and motioned for Kantor to follow. She cut a straight line through the crowds to the front door, and the world got quieter once they were past it. Vanna herself was distracted, carrying a mix or hope and anxiety. Kantor prodded it at it, where it lay at the edge of his own feelings. “You’re thinking about the skinny guy with the big red sash?”
Vanna turned beat red, avoiding his gaze. “Seriously? The worst.”
“Nah…I’m the best.” Kantor grinned at her, casually, like everything was a big joke.
“Why is that?” It was difficult to stay nervous when Kantor put on his affable jackass routine. It was something he’d perfected during the war.
“Because I figured it out an hour ago.” This is true. He couldn’t give her the whole answer up front. He wanted her to ask, because that’s how she’d get invested in the conversation.
“Reading my mind an hour ago isn’t better weirdo.” She was still defensive, but not asking was building up that curiosity in her.
“It could be a lot better…if at some point since I’d also read his mind.”
Vanna stopped dead in her tracks. “That…seems…kind of wrong…”
“Oh. Well then. I’ll just never tell anyone.”
“I-okay. What do you know?”
“Your boy had a bad break up recently.”
“Everyone knows that. He’s been miserable ever since Natalie dumped him.”
“Do they know that actually he dumped her, and that secretly he’s really happy to be out of it?”
She rounded on him and jabbed a finger into his chest. “Explain.”
“He’s playing it up the whole sadness thing, he’s just terrified of his ex. She talks a big game about her father being the ISB, kid thinks she’s gonna make him disappear. So, he acts extra sad and lets her tell everyone she ended it to avoid pissing her off. Thing is? I brushed past the girl’s dad, too. He’s a logistics support guy, makes sure the offices are supplied. There are janitors with higher security clearance.”
“So…he’s actually safe.”
“Well…from his ex at least…not that he knows that. He’s definitely looking for someone who could protect him. If the daughter of a Moff started talking to him, she’d get his undivided attention…”
Vanna’s jaw dropped open. “You actually are the best…”
“Ah, it’s what brothers are supposed to do. Now go get your boy.”
“Don’t you…”
“Nah, I’m good. He’s like…that way.” Kantor point up and vaguely left, through the ceiling. “I can figure it out. Just wanted to ditch the crowd before a said all that.”
Vanna clapped her hands together before dashing off back to the party.
Kantor was left to wander the glorified fortress his mother had settled in. The place was designed to repel a siege, there was nothing subtle about it. The attempt was made to soften the aesthetic, but a painting hung between a pair of turret controls could only do so much. The blast proof plates still rattled despite the plush carpet laid over them, and the wood paneling on the doors didn’t completely disguise the fact that they were all three inches of solid steel. It took Kantor ten minutes to find the stairways he needed to get to his stepfather’s study, and when he arrived, he could feel a small party going on the other side of the door. The Moff himself would never be seen attending his own party. It wasn’t the Moff’s rule, but Kantor’s mother would never allow him to do something so gauche. Kantor opened the door and stepped into the soft light of the study. It was a big room and was currently dominated by a massive Sabacc table.
His stepfather, Moff Albrecht Hirch, filled the seat at the head of the table. He was a broad, sagging man with a warm smile. One could hardly believe he was the hand responsible for choking the freedom out of two star sectors. He laughed merrily over some joke Kantor was too late to here.
Kantor’s mother sat on his left. Anthea Fel was no Anthea Hircsh. Very little was left of the sixteen-year-old girl who’d abandoned Kantor in an alley on Nar Shadaa. Having conned her way ruthlessly into high society, wealth and privilege had softened Anthea. Kantor could almost mistake her for someone motherly now. She smiled proudly at him as he stepped into the room, for reasons Kantor didn’t understand.
At Albrecht’s opposite hand sat his eldest daughter, Elsa. She had the same golden blonde hair as her sisters’, with the same fair complexion and green eyes. She wore her hair up for the event and stared boredly at the table. She was 6 months out of University and had insisted on being in the grown-up room for the gala. She had no interest in what was happening at the table though.
Next to Elsa was a man who made Kantor have to suppress a sneer. The Inquisitor, 21st Brother. His face bore intense scarring, to the point where Kantor couldn’t tell whether or not he was human to begin with. There was a coldness that emanated from the Inquisitor, and he didn’t suppress his own sneer as Kantor stepped into the room.
Next to the Inquisitor, and clearly more nervous about it than Kantor was, sat a man older than Hirsch. He wore the olive dress uniform that marked him as an army officer. He was the general responsible for enforcing Hirsch’s will on the sectors, and he’d gotten there less by skill and more by an openness to brutality that drove results in the eyes of his commanders.
Next was the Commodore, opposite Hircsh. The Commodore was a career man, and had earned his command at the tender age of 42. If he cared about Kantor he didn’t show it. He stared intently at the other players, clearly more interested in his colleagues at the table.
Sitting between the Commodore and the only open seat at the table was a woman wearing the white uniform the ISB favored. She was the spook, responsible for making sure no one in the sectors had anything that could be mistaken for privacy…minus the Moff and his family of course.
Hirsch’s voice rang out cheerfully, tinged with a bit more wine than was likely responsible. “Kantor! Kantor, come sit with us!!” He motioned to the empty seat between the spook and Kantor’s own mother. “Finally, I have a son to smoke cigars and play cards with! Anthea’s told me all about your escapes on Canto! Its time these people saw what a REAL Sabacc player can do!!”
Kantor gave a small smile. “I guess I could use some walking around money...” Kantor was not short on cash. He’d built himself a small fortune cheating casinos on Canto Bight after he left the order. He could afford to retire truth be told. He just didn’t have the connections to survive being retired, that’s what he was counting on his mother for. Kantor through 10,000 credits into the pot, casually. It was the same choreographed motion he’d polished on Canto. He had smoothly transitioned to his seat before he took in the shocked expressions from everyone else at the table. “Is…something wrong.”
The Commodore glanced at the Moff for direction, before speaking meekly. “We were only playing for 500 each…”
This inspired a fountain of heart laughter from Albrecht. “HaHA! My sons a high roller! Puts us all to shame!!” Then, as an after, turned to his wife. “He must get that from YOU!”
Anthea giggled politely as Kantor withdrew his initial bet, replacing it with 500 credits instead. The robot determined the pot was even and began dealing cards. Kantor watched his competition at the peripheral of his vision, absorbing their character as they lifted the first hand from the plush velvet of the card table.
Anthea lifted her cards. She glanced them over, then politely folded. She got a coy smile on her face. Her cards were good, if she was trying to win the credits in the middle of the table she’d have played that hand. Anthea wasn’t playing for credits though. She was playing to stroke Albrecht’s ego, and she was quietly amusing herself with her little side bets.
Albrecht lifted his cards enthusiastically. Even sober though, he never had much of a head for numbers. Kantor clocked the confusion as Albrecht tried to decide if the cards, he was holding were good or not. It was the kind of thing a skilled player would know instantly. Albrecht was not a skilled player. He stayed in for the first hand.
Elsa had glanced at her cards briefly, then folded. Kantor wasn’t sure if she was paying attention to the game at all. She caught him looking at her and smiled, like they were sharing some profound secret.
The Inquisitor was emanating an odd chill, clearly reaching out with the force to cheat, the same way Kantor had done a thousand times before. He locked eyes with Kantor, and Kantor felt him brushing the edge of his mind. He knew the inquisitor wouldn’t find anything. Kantor had spent his childhood hiding secrets in the heart of the Jedi temple. He wouldn’t be giving anything up to a rank amateur.
The General lifted his cards and nodded approvingly. He then promptly folded. Clearly someone who knew the game well enough, but as far as Kantor could tell the General was playing his own cards, not the opponents at the table.
The Commodore was nervous. He had too much riding on this game. Clearly, he was playing to impress the Moff. His mind wasn’t focused on the game and even if it was Kantor wasn’t sure he’d have been a major threat.
The spook was the only one Kantor considered a legitimate threat, at Sabacc and otherwise. She checked the edge of her cards, and Kantor could see the calculations running smoothly through her mind. She checked.
That placed the action to Kantor. Sabacc was an exercise in patience, doubly so when you were cheating at it. Kantor’s cards were playable, but the table wasn’t, not until he knew the players better. He folded, returning all but one of his cards to the droid at the center of the table. He kept one card tucked up his sleeve, just in case. The hand was taken by the spook, and a new hand was dealt.
The spook struck up conversation as the next round of the cards were being dealt. “Tell us Kantor, where have you been all these years Anthea has been married to our dear Hircsh?” Albrecht looked annoyed, but not enough to step him. Everyone else waited with bated breath.
“Studying abroad.” Kantor answered with a casual, bored tone of voice as he scanned his next hand. Had feigned interest in his cards as an excuse to avoid eye contact, and to shore up his dismissive attitude. Seeming interested in a topic just made other people interested.
“Oh? What university?”
“An arts school on Bothawui.” Bothawui wasn’t part of the empire…it would be an extra hurdle if the spook decided to verify his story.
The spooks eyes narrowed though. She could tell he was being evasive. “What was the name of the school?”
Kantor laughed falsely. “It’s not the kind place you brag about.” Graceful, plausible, and self-deprecating enough to sell most of the crowd. And unbeknownst to the spook, a deliberate trap.
Her brow furrowed. She was an interrogator by trade, and Kantor was letting her see him squirm, just a little. Just to put some blood in the water, just enough to draw her in. “What’s the name of the university?” She was forceful. The hunter’s instincts kicked in.
Kantor leaned away, his expression shifting on a dime. “If you’re trying to embarrass me…” And still, she didn’t see the trap.
She was about to press him harder when Albrecht roared from his end of the table. “Of course she isn’t! There’s no shame in humble beginnings! Helga, why are you trying to ruin everyone’s night? Just play your cards.”
Helga the spook was sundered. Kantor imagined she’d never been played like that before. Her eyes darted between him and Albrecht, before she mumbled a vague apology. “It’s alright. We’re all safer because you ask uncomfortable questions.” Kantor smiled and felt the hot spike of fury in her even as she offered him the demurest smile she could.
Then the cards came out. Kantor had another good hand. He’d have played it against three other people…but not on a table this side. He folded, and the General took the pot. The room was a bit quieter during the next round of dealing. It was a room full of career politicians. They were measuring their career prospects against there desire to deal with the problems Kantor presented. Clearly, they didn’t like their odds. Albrecht was happy to talk loudly and chortle at his own jokes, so there was no pressure to make small talk.
Kantor folded another three hands before playing. They were won by the commodore, the general, and the inquisitor respectfully. As he lost, Kantor had been siphoning the best cards he was dealt, squirrelling them away for the right moment, biding his time.
On the fourth hand, he was feeling the pressure on his chip stack. He had to take enough pots to keep posting antes, and he hadn’t played a hand yet. The Commodore was first to bet and raised. Kantor could feel his confidence. He was holding something decent. Kantor, at this point, was holding whatever he wanted to be holding. Helga the Spook folded. Kantor raised. It was a token raise, but a call would have been suspicious. Anthea regarded him with curiosity. She folded. Albrecht arched an eyebrow and called. Albrecht called every hand, so this was indicative of nothing. Elsa folded but looked more interested than she had on any of the hands she actually played. The Inquisitor folded, probing at the edge of Kantor’s mind and frustrated at his lack of progress. The General folded, still playing his own cards and not the table. The Commodore stared Kantor down. He was unsure...then he found a sense of resolve. He called Kantor’s raise, and the next round of betting began.
The commodore was the first to play. He shuffled a card out of his hand for a draw from the deck. His confidence grew. He raised, substantially. He was a hunter; Kantor clocked a pilot’s medal on his dress uniform. He was the kind of man who chose a direction and lost sight of anything else. Kantor drew a card, and called, telegraphing weakness, confirming what the commodore believed to be true. The raise was big enough that even Albrecht folded. Play returned to the commodore. He drew nothing. He raised heavily. Kantor didn’t break eye contact. Kantor drew nothing. He doubled the raise. Whoever lost this hand would barely make ante for the next. The commodore was shaken. He was trying to decide what Kantor must be holding. He was committed though, and through in the last of his chips. Kantor called.
The last round of play was over, and the commodore never realized that his true weakness was playing first. It didn’t matter what Kantor had been dealt, because the Commodore would have to reveal his cards before Kantor did. The Commodore drew nothing, and neither did Kantor. The Commodore flipped his cards over, revealing a strong hand, but not one Kantor would have gone all in with. “Sorry friend….” For a brief second everyone was looking at Kantor instead of the table. It didn’t matter, even if they watched, none of them would have noticed the motions as he lifted his cards of the table, swapped them up his sleeved during a dramatic flourish, then laid down a hand slightly stronger than the commodore’s.
The poor Commodore was crestfallen for a moment, but he recovered quickly. “You are a master gambler, aren’t you Mister Fel?”
“I’ve played a few hands before…”
The Inquisitor stared daggers at Kantor. He knew Kantor had cheated, but he wasn’t sure how. The ISB agent was less sure. Her eyes lingered on the cuff of his shirt sleeve but Kantor new how to hide any evidence of his cheating. Anthea had a look of pride Kantor had never seen from her before, which filled him with an emotion that was about as alien as her expression.
The next hand started, and Kantor folded. He had bought himself enough breathing room for a bit. Another few rounds passed. Albrecht busted out and bought back in. Kantor considered carefully his marks. He bought in for a few small pots, making sure people saw him lose every so often. The Inquisitor never played a losing hand, and easy feat when you had the power of prophecy. The General continued to consolidate an increasing stack of chips. Helga the Spook played her opponents, exploiting Elsa, Albrecht and Anthea primarily. Anthea continued to lose gracefully, except for the occasional hand where she quietly dominated the room, keeping herself alive to continue playing. Elsa just seemed to want to be the in the room.
They played a dozen hands before Kantor decided to play again. The biggest threat was the general, and even all in, Kantor didn’t have the chips to break him. If he didn’t break him soon though, the old man would freeze the table out like a slowly grinding glacier. He waited for a turn that the general raised out of the gate. Kantor looked at his cards. It was a lucky draw. Kantor called. It would have been smart to raise, which is why he didn’t. The inquisitor had already folded, and the commodore was out of the game. The Inquisitor had been struggling in hands against the General and folded. Anthea folded after Kantor called. She had been avoiding playing the same hands as Kantor. Whether this was an odd bit of crooked mothering or a respect for Kantor’s skill he couldn’t be sure. Albrecht raised, but Kantor could feel Albrecht was just bored and wanted to play. Elsa called. It was a big pot, a game changing one, and the General called the raise. Kantor showed nothing. He called and the betting closed.
The general drew, and raised again, aggressively. Kantor called. Albrecht called. Elsa folded. The betting closed. The last round the general didn’t draw. He was holding the hand he wanted. Kantor didn’t either. The general flipped his cards. “Sabacc.” He said it calmly, confidently. He was confident in his hand.
“Prime Sabacc.” Kantor hadn’t cheated. He just got a lucky draw. But nothing beat Prime Sabacc. Even if the General had also drawn Prime Sabacc, the worst that could have happened is they split pot, giving Kantor have of Elsa and Albrecht’s bets. Instead, he took everything, more than doubling his chips, and kneecapping the Generals ability to bully other players at the table.
The general’s lips pulled back into a contented smile. “Well played, little Hircsh.” Kantor caught sight of Albrecht beaming with pride from his periphery.
Another few hands passed. Kantor played some and folded others. Helga the Spook maintained a survivable position. Elsa dropped to a barely tenable position. Anthea maintained solvency without making herself stand out.
The Inquisitor continued to only call winning hands, playing robotically. Kantor knew he couldn’t use the force “loudly” in the Inquisitors presence, but he’d cheated similarly when he was starting out. The Inquisitor was looking into the future, seeing what the cards would be…then just playing when his cards were best. It was a method that looked fool proof on the surface, but Kantor knew it’s weakness. It was seven hands before the Inquisitor stayed in. Kantor had already committed to beating him. He could be certain what the Inquisitors hand was, but he was certain what options he had for his own. Kantor raised, and the Inquisitor grinned viciously. “Do you like your odds, gambler?”
“Maybe…maybe I just think you’re bluffing. Maybe I’ve just got too many chips and I want to keep it interesting…”
The Inquisitor continued to play robotically, raising and choosing his draws almost automatically. It was after the second round of betting that Kantor made his move. He began tapping out an irregular rhythm on the table, letting a ring he wore on his tap the wooden edge every few meters. It was a prank he used to play at the temple. A little ear worm that made meditation nearly impossible. It drove his nearly mad. “Something wrong, Inquisitor?” The man was visibly perturbed, unable to look forward in time to be sure of his victory, or to check his current decision. He shook his head, playing through it as best he could. He still held the snapshots of his visions in his head. He still new what cards he and Kantor were destined to hold at the end of it.
Except Kantor didn’t leave his cards up to destiny. And the Inquisitor had revealed his cards first. The Inquisitors cards were better than what Kantor had been dealt…but they weren’t nearly as good as what Kantor revealed. The Inquisitor shrieked when he saw them. “Those weren’t your cards!”
Everyone at the table looked at the Inquisitor, questioningly. Kantor’s expression was both deeply mystified and deeply false. “Inquisitor…do you have camera’s set up or something? That would be cheating…” Kantor feigned looking around the room for a camera he knew didn’t exist. The con worked better when someone else supplied the answer.
Helga’s face grew a joyless smile. “He wouldn’t have to. He’s told us many times…he can see the future…” Kantor could sense a deep vein of animosity between Helga and the Inquisitor.
“I-” Incada felt the trap spring now. Too late though.
Albrecht grew red in the face. He may not have been good at the game but he certainly didn’t like being cheated. “Incada…have you been cheating?”
Incada the Inquisitor’s face twisted as he looked at Kantor. “I can see the future, and I know those weren’t your cards, Fel.”
“And…the future can never be changed?” Incada’s face twitched. Another piece of the trap springing and it was getting painful for him.
The future could always change. Kantor had drawn Incada to the offensive, thinking he’d pull Kantor down with him…only to feel the ground slip out from beneath his feet.
Helga was there to twist the knife. “Is it real so hard to believe that you, an amateur at this game, lost to a professional, Incada? Even if you were cheating.”
Kantor could feel the rage seeping out of the Inquisitor. He danced with it as he lifted his winnings, slowly, from the center to the table. Incada bristled with each stack of chips, until the anger was too much. Incada stood straight up. “I’m…needed elsewhere.” Helga’s lips thinned victoriously. The old General rolled his eyes while Albrecht sneered at the retreating Incada.
Eventually the room quieted. Two players had been eliminated. The general’s systemic playstyle was off balance after the sizeable loss to Kantor, and without the winnings from his prior victories to stave off the unavoidable bad luck, he was slowly being ground down. Elsa lost the last of her chips to hand she likely shouldn’t have played and shifted her whole attention to Kantor. Kantor had withdrawn from some of the play, preserving his advantage. Kantor played Sabacc the way he did most things. Waiting in the shadows until the time arrived for him to claim a decisive victory, then fading away all over again.
A few hands later Helga placed an aggressive raise, prompting Kantor to fold. Anthea called. Kantor looked at his mother, but she was staring straight at Helga. There was a predatory feeling in Anthea that made Kantor glad he folded. It wasn’t something you could see in her body language. Anthea was an impeccable liar; Kantor was confident that most people here never even knew about her extended period of homelessness early in life.
Albrecht folded, making Kantor suspect that the man knew is wife better than most. Elsa was still staring at Kantor in a way that made him uncomfortable. The General’s cards weren’t worth it and he folded. It was just Helga, and the Great Jungle Cat Anthea circling her on silent paws. Helga raised and called, played the best cards she could, and Kantor could feel at every turn the feelings of a hunter who was in control of its prey. The cards flipped, and Helga lost everything.
Helga took the defeat gracefully, excusing herself. When Helga left the commodore left. Two hands later the general busted out, being eliminated by Albrecht of all people, and the general also made for the door. Kantor was left with nothing but the odd pieces of his stitched together family that he didn’t know well. He cleared his throat awkwardly. “A lot of empty space….” He shifted his chips down to spaces, to the seat the commodore had been in.
“Good idea! We should all spread out a little.” Elsa was on her feet before Kantor could react, and claimed the general’s former seat, directly next to him. “And I’m looking forward to my new big brother explaining how this silly game actually works.”
“Perhaps we should just adjourn? The guests have all left, we’d only be playing with our own family’s money anyway….” Anthea began moving to clear up her space at the table.
“Aren’t you curious?” Kantor’s question hung in the air between everyone.
Anthea tilted her head. “Curious about what, darling?”
“Which of us would be left standing.”
There was a tension. Kantor couldn’t understand the storm of emotions beneath Anthea’s façade. She didn’t answer, and Kantor made no motion to withdraw the question. The tension lingered, until finally Albrecht broke it. “Perhaps I would be the winner!” He laughed uproariously at what he clear knew was a joke. He wagged a finger at Anthea jovially. “And don’t think I didn’t know you were going easy on us darling.”
Anthea and Kantor stared at each other, trying to read one another without giving up any details about themselves. Finally, Anthea relented. “Alright Kantor. Let’s play…but empty your sleeves. I’m not going to waste time on a rigged game.”
Albrecht looked offended on Kantor’s behalf and looked like he was about to say something. Kantor shrugged and emptied them. “Sure…now you put your shoes on the table.”
Elsa looked baffled. “Why would she do that?”
Anthea smiled. Possibly a hint of pride? She reached down, removed her shoes, and laid them in plain site on the table. “So that I can’t use the remote a slipped into them to signal the droid when I want good cards…”
Albrecht laughed. Elsa looked slightly stricken. “You were BOTH cheating?!”
“Of course, sweetheart. If you really want to learn, let this be your first lesson: there are a thousand ways to cheat at Sabacc. I assume that’s a magnetic ring? Tuned to the chance cube you swapped with mine earlier?”
Kantor smiled. “Of course it is. Second lesson for you Elsa…the crime in Sabacc isn’t cheating. It’s getting caught cheating.”
Anthea nodded sagely. “Well said my child. But lose the ring please.”
Kantor shrugged nonchalantly. “Only if you take off the earrings.”
Elsa glanced between them. “What do her earrings have to do with anything?”
Anthea smiled that same almost proud smile. “Ah. They have radio receivers in them. The droid sends a small vibration to the earrings whenever it deals someone a better hand than mine.”
Elsa looked a little overwhelmed. “So, you always knew when you’d win?”
Anthea shot her the kind of look mothers typically reserved for poor conduct in public places. “Of course not. The hands change every round. On its own I could easily bet into the third round only to have someone else suddenly pick up the winning card…not to mention any people who might be playing with cards the droid hadn’t dealt them that hand.”
“That’s why you always folded against me?”
“Obviously. Why play with risk when I could play without risk?”
Albrecht hand slapped the table with merriment. “My genius wife and genius son!”
Anthea beamed at him. Did his mother actually love Albrecht? Was a love a thing Anthea Fel was capable of? That disturbed Kantor. He shook it off though. “I assume you haven’t bothered marking the cards.”
Anthea’s nose wrinkled like she smelled something rotting. “Of course not. Marking cards is for amateurs. Too little return and too easy to catch. Besides, I already rigged the droid.”
“He’s an impressive droid.” Kantor gave the dealer droid a slight nod as it clicked and whirred appreciatively.
With the ground rules set between them, and the cards were dealt. If Sabacc at a table full of people was an exercise in patience, a game with only two players was doubly so. Hircsh called every hand, while Kantor and Anthea folded almost every play, only stepping in when success was guaranteed, each fighting over Hircsh’s chips, carving up his meager winnings for whatever advantage they could gather before they were left with only each other. Eventually, Albrecht busted out. They both held an absolute lack of expression frozen on their faces. Kantor couldn’t read Anthea’s feelings. He had met conmen as a Jedi who had learned to feel more quietly, and too slip past the Jedi. He had never met anyone this good at it though. His own face remained passive. He’d been lying to mind readers for his whole childhood. Kantor never gave away more than he intended to. They passed ante’s back and forth for over an hour while Albrecht and Elsa made small talk with each other, neither certain of how to handle the silent intensity they were watching.
The sounds of the party outside were dying down as Anthea and Kantor continued their stalemate. Occassionally Anthea prodeed at him with small bets. Kantor attempted a few bluffs. Neither of them was willing to cede any meaningful advantage to the other. Finally, Kantor decide there was only one way he might win. “All in.”
Anthea’s eyes flicked up at him. Albrecht snapped upright in his chair. Elsa suddenly bothered to watch the game.
“You finally get a good hand, big brother?” Her voice had the same tinge of flirtation that made Kantor wildly uncomfortable.
Anthea’s eyes passed over him, her smile the widest it had been all night. “He has no idea.”
Albrecht glanced between the two of them, deeply confused by the sudden shift in energy. “What do you mean?”
Kantor smiled. “She can read me too well…but I haven’t looked at my cards yet. So now she has to play blind.”
Anthea glanced at her cards, then looked back at her son. “I call.”
The two drew and discard where they could over the next three rounds, but there were no more bets to place. Kantor flipped his cards. It was a good hand. Not prime Sabacc, but one worth playing. Anthea smiled. She tapped her cards gently and returned them to the waiting droid.
Kantor’s brow furrowed. “What were you holding?”
Anthea’s face seemed to draw in the shadows around her. “You’ll never know, sweetheart.”
Kantor arched and eye brow. “Did you win or lose.”
Anthea only smiled at him. It didn’t matter who took the pot. Neither of them needed the money. The prize for both of them finally seeing the other. Anthea learning that her son was a man who would gamble everything to win, Kantor seeing that his mother would rather confront aggression out than suffer a tedious battle of attrition.
The droid cleaned up the table. Kantor stood slowly. “Long night, I could use a shower.”
Anthea nodded. Albrecht, still slightly drunk, grinned from ear to ear. Then, Elsa, annoyingly, sprang up from her seat. “I’ll show you the best way to your room.” It was a deeply uncomfortable proposal that Albrecht and Anthea both seemed oblivious to.
She clearly had him trapped, so he didn’t bother arguing with her. They got about half a hallway from the study when Anthea stopped him. “So, you and I need to talk about us.” She leaned heavily on the word us. Kantor’s eye twitched.
“We do?” Kantor feigned indifference. He understood what she’d meant with the looks she’d been giving him. He just thought he’d be able to avoid it.
“Yes. We do.” She was not going let him avoid it.
“Do we?” Maybe she’d let him avoid it?
She was not going to let him avoid it. “Adorable. Yes Kantor, we do. Clearly, my father sees you as his eldest son. Up until now, I’ve been his eldest daughter. This arrangement could the inheritance by a substantial margin.” Maybe that wasn’t the looks meant?
Kantor already had money. Money was easy to get. It was friends he needed. “What…? No, just…take the inheritance, I don’t want it.”
Elsa had never met someone who didn’t think money was very important and had never considered the prospect someone might decline the opportunity to acquire more of it. “Oh of course. Me neither. I *HATE* being wealthy, powerful and comfortable in life. Seriously, splitting the inheritance would be bad for all of us.”
“So…don’t split it….” Kantor really never needed to acquire another credit in life. He had enough cash to buy his own mansion about the same size. He just didn’t live in a government that would let him.
“That’s what I’m proposing.” Elsa didn’t break stride. She merely continued leading him with her nose slightly in the air.
“Is it?” Kantor had perfect confidence that Elsa hadn’t proposed anything.
“It very much is.” Was it though?
“Right…this can’t be the fastest way to my room.” Kantor had been to his room many times since he moved in a week ago. It had never taken this long to get there.
“It isn’t. I told you this would be the BEST way to your room.” This statement seemed inherently contradictory to Kantor, though he wasn’t sure he’d get anywhere pointing that out to Elsa.
“Right…seems like those would be the same thing…” He decided he’d try pointing it out anyway, he didn’t have much else to do.
“They most certainly are not.” As she said it they turned the corner to a pair of glass doors that let to a large pool of water, lit from the bottom, under and open sky. There was a warm breeze blowing across the space as Elsa led him on to it. “This root is deeply circuitous…and yet we get to swim…”
Kantor was a bit annoyed at this point. “Okay…I’m not getting what you’re getting what you’re trying to tell me here….”
“Oh?” Elsa turned away from him, lifting her dress over her head and stepping slowly into the pool. “I think you could figure it all out.” She walked until she was neck deep then slowly turned over in the water to face Kantor. “Are you going to join me?”
Kantor stood at the pool, fully dressed, arms folded. “I am not.”
She rolled her eyes at him. “Why are you being difficult?” In Kantor’s opinion he wasn’t being especially difficult, which made him all the more insufferably obstinate to Elsa. “Look. The only way this family arrangement works, and everyone wins, is if we marry.”
“What?” Elsa’s line of thinking would only make sense to someone raised amongst nobility. As Kantor was raised in an emotionally stunted monastic order, he was not able to make sense of this.
“Obviously. You and I can BOTH inherit without crippling our family is if we inherit as a wedded couple. It’s not especially complicated.” Elsa was clearly annoyed having to explain something so simple.
“You...are my stepsister.” And…siblings…do not marry. This was something the even an emotionally stunted monk knew.
If anything, Elsa became more energetic at this point. “Precisely! There isn’t even consanguinity to contend with!”
Cosanguinity wasn’t a word normally people had usually even heard before, but he managed to parse it out from context. He was still not interested in marrying his stepsister. “So…you…does my mother know you’re trying to….”
“Seduce you?” Her tone was light and airy, as though she was just being helpful.
“That’s what we’re calling this?” The whole situation was annoying Kantor, enough that starscape lit by three moons, the breathtaking vista from the edge of the fortress, and the very beautiful woman with water dripping down the contours of her naked body, were all entirely lost on him.
She tried her best to laugh it off. “Don’t be rude. And yes, of course she does. She was the one who suggested it.”
“What?” No. He was somehow even less interested in the courtship having learned that his mother was involved.
“I was concerned over our family’s prospects with you returning to her. She pointed out the possibility of a marriage, she even recommended taking you to the pool tonight. Apparently, this is where my father brought her for their first time.” Kantor skipped back a couple of paces away from the edge of the pool, as though it were tainted.
“What a piece of work…she just said all that?”
Kantor was about to say something more, when Elsa cut him off. “Don’t be rude to our mother.” Elsa had taken on an edge of anger Kantor hadn’t seen before. She was being genuine in a way he didn’t realize she could.
“What…?” He took another step back as Elsa waded out of the pool, advancing on him.
“Anthea is…I won’t tolerate anyone disrespecting my mother, Kantor Fel.” He could feel the anger seeping out of her. It wasn’t the tainted rage he felt when he touched the darkside. It was a righteous anger, born of love and loyalty.
The entire conversation was throwing Kantor of balance, confusing him. He wasn’t ready to talk, but it was clearly his turn to talk. “You mean your stepmother?”
He couldn’t have hurt Elsa more if he’d slapped her. He could feel a deep sadness, and a sharp fear. She worried that Anthea might not be her mother forever. “Are you always such a hurtful ass?”
“Usually the majority opinion when I’m around.” Kantor rubbed the back of his neck awkwardly. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said any of that. This is a lot to get my head around all at once.”
Elsa’s feelings cooled while she stood in front of him, naked with her arms crossed as the water dripped off her. Then they turned a bit, like she was considering Kantor as a person for the first time. She shrugged, uncrossed her arms, then started ringing her hair out. “Are you not interested in women?”
“I…well more than I’m interested in women than men, if that’s what you’re asking.”
“Okay…so…have you never…?” Elsa looked meaningfully at him, a very slight smile on her lips.
“No…I have…once in a while…” Sex had always been a self-destructive catharsis for Kantor, visited with drunken strangers and vague associates, with desperate energy in improvised locations, before fading away from one another and never speaking again.
Elsa wasn’t going to let it lie though. “Is this just some weird hang up with the whole ‘study abroad’ thing you did with the Jedi?” It was a fairly insightful question, but Kantor’s entire body tensed up.
“Anthea told you I was a Jedi?” This was a bad thing. That’s not even a word Kantor wanted people speaking. It was a dangerous word that got people killed.
“Of course she did. We don’t keep secrets in our family.” She said this matter of factly, while she stood completely nude in the crisp night air. Kantor felt the family could benefit from less trust and more secrets. “So, you like women, you’ve been with women, you just don’t want to be with me?”
Finally! Kantor saw an opportunity to get free from the whole conversation and he jumped on it. “Yes!”
Elsa was a little surprised by the enthusiasm but took it in stride. “I’m not as pretty as the other girls…?”
Kantor had never really considered the attractiveness of his partners. That would have taken a level of human connection, not to mention a level of lighting, that he had never really wanted to associate with sex. Now that someone had forced the idea on him though…Elsa was very pretty, and that would probably make the sex better. “That’s not it.”
“Then what is it?” She rolled her eyes dramatically, but she was back to flirting again, and that meant she was angry at him…which was more important to him than he expected.
“You’re my mother’s daughter.” Kantor wished desperately to be so functional as a person that that was the reason he wasn’t interested.
“Which is really not that weird.” She took a step toward him, posing a little as she closed the gap between them.
“Sure, okay, fair…but, ACTUALLY…it’s very weird. Probably too weird to be worth considering.” She kept walking, hips swaying, until she was very close to him.
“I think you just don’t like me.” She put her arms around his neck, and her face was doing a pouty look Kantor had never seen much of when she looked up at him.
“Look…awkward seductions aside, I like you a lot. I really do. I just don’t want to marry you. Because we’re already family.” But that wasn’t the reason, and he wasn’t pushing her arms away either.
“First off, it was an excellent seduction, you’re just bad at being seduced.” She was all smiles now; things were finally going the way she wanted. “Secondly…I would love to have as healthy a sex life with my future spouse as our mother and father have.”
“Ugh, no. Don’t tell me that. They don’t actually still….?” Kantor had put a fair amount of effort into not considering in any way the things his Trophy-Wife mother did for her husband.
“What do you think they’re doing alone in the study right now?” Elsa clearly just didn’t have any of Kantor’s shame regarding sex. To be more accurate, Kantor had shame around most feelings, but most feelings weren’t relevant to the moment
“Maybe they’re playing Sabacc?” Kantor looked hopefully at her.
She rolled her eyes again, but she was getting less annoyed now that she knew what to expect from him. “Okay, Kantor. Look, my point is life isn’t a fairy tale. As long as we’re honest with each other, and we’re partners, we can have whatever affairs make the marriage work, it really doesn’t bother me.” It felt good having someone’s arms around his neck like that. It made him feel hopeful. Hope made him even more uncomfortable than intimacy.
“You just…don’t get any part of my life, do you?” From the outside it looked like Elsa was beating her head against a wall, but she could see him wanting to be understood.
“Well. It’s not like you’ve shared anything.” She raised her eyebrows, and the moons caught her eyes, dancing in them like sparkles. “Tell me something you don’t usually tell people.”
That was hard. He had survived by making himself a vault, by never letting anything slip out, so that none of it could linger in his mind. If he opened the vault, would he control any of the things that came spilling out? Elsa watched him, and he wanted to believe that he could tell her these things. He was desperate to believe it. He spoke but nothing came out. She looked up at him, questioning, concerned. “I knew.”
She tilted her head, patient as she watched him. “What did you know?”
“The…the end. The great scream….the fall of the Jedi. I knew it was coming. It’s why I got out.”
“What…when did you see it?”
“I was five, the first time. I tried to tell people, but every time I tried the vision changed. Me getting killed for threatening whoever planned it. I tried a hundred different ways, but every time I died and I didn’t help anyone.”
Elsa was confused, only vaguely aware of the events Kantor had seen. There was something deeper there that he wasn’t saying. “Kantor…when did you see this?”
“I…” He didn’t want to say. The shame ran deep, and he’d been burying it for a long time. Elsa was going to push though. He could feel it. “I was five the first time I saw it-”
He stopped talking when she pulled him in for a hug that was tighter than her realized she was capable of.
“Well then. I suppose that explains why you were able to manipulate the card game. Shame that you have to die before I learn how you did it.” A third voice issued from the doorway behind the two. “But we can’t go playing with fire. You really will have to die here tonight.” Inquisitor Incada stepped slowly out of the shadows. Incada looked at Elsa, who was now covering herself with her hands. He clucked his tongue dissaprovingly. “Aiding and sheltering a Jedi…certainly offering one comfort... You and your whole family will have to be put to death for this Lady Elsa." Kantor pulled of his coat, thigh length but better than nothing, and handed it to Elsa.
"What? You don’t have the authority to do anything of the sort.” Elsa was riding a flare of anger. If she new how to wield the force she’d have been the most dangerous one present. Unfortunately, she did not.
Incada ignited his lightsaber in response. “You’ll find that the Inquisition is more interested in seeking forgiveness than permission….and it’s not as though you’ll be able to give a contradictory account when I’m done.”
“Yeah…but I get the strangest feeling you’re the kind of guy that doesn’t always finish.” Kantor grinned like a jack ass when he was in danger. Danger was very funny to him, he never knew why. He squared off against Incada, pulling his blaster free from it’s holster.
Elsa hissed in his ear. “Don’t you have a plasma cutter like he does?”
That…is not what they were called. “I don’t usually carry it.”
“Well maybe start.”
“I’ll work on it.” Kantor stepped away from her, facing Incada. There was no more need for subtlety. They were both bright shining points in the force now, seeing each other plainly. “I’m not a Jedi, if that changes anything. I failed the trials, was dismissed from the order.”
Incada sneered. “Hardly relevant to the Inquisition Fel.” Incada hated Kantor, but it was a young hatred, not yet properly nurtured. Incada himself was inexperienced, his knowledge of the force inadequate. The Inquisitor rushed forward, leaning on his weapons instead of the force. His eyes were locked on Kantor’s torso, and he trusted his eyes. He gave a shout of sadistic glee as his eyes told him his blade sank into its target. He should have looked at Kantor through the force. It might have saved him.
His victory turned to ash in his mouth, as he himself stumbled through the empty space that he thought was Kantor Fel. The confusion was more than Kantor needed. Incada felt the danger on the other side of the confusion that was gripping him, but he didn’t have the skill or the discipline to grasp the force on the otherside of his own confused feelings. By the time he thought to defend himself, by the time he realized his enemy had sidestepped him while his eyes had been deceived, the barrel of Kantor’s blaster was already pressed against his head.
Kantor didn’t hesitate. The blaster bolt burned into Incada’s left temple and out of his right temple. Kantor didn’t even look at the falling body. Kantor didn’t never used his eyes much when fighting. He had deceived too many people who counted on their vision too much, like poor dead Incada who was now smoldering at his feet. It may have been connecting to the force that did it, or it may have been killing someone. Kantor hoped it was connecting to the force. In either case, he felt his old confidence as he looked at himself reflected in the water of the pool. He had the ice in his veins again. He felt alive in a way he hadn’t since he first started running from the Order. He looked over at Elsa, shivering and dripping wet in the moonlight. She was stunned, still staring at the dead body. “Did…you still want to fuck in the pool?” She looked up him, and shook her head slowly. “Yeah, fair enough.” Kantor dragged the body to the edge of the patio. The ground was a thousand feet below, and densely forested. He was lucky, as he spotted a river flowing through it. Rivers were a great place to hide inconvenient bodies.
He needed the force to counter the heavy winds and steer him toward the channel, but he was able to drop Incada’s body over the edge and land it in the river. By the time someone found it, it would be useless for evidence. He wandered back to where Elsa was shivering. “You alright?”
“You just killed somebody.” She was huddled in his jacket, here eyes fixed on something that didn’t truly exist. Her feelings were the quietest they’d been all night.
“Yeah…not the first time for that either.”
“I knew him.”
“Yeah…he-”
“No. I know…you had to. Just…will you take me to my room?”
Kantor put his arm around her and led her back to the fortress. It had been a complicated night for Kantor. Did his mother feel love? What did he want Elsa to be? How was he going to deal with a missing Inquisitor? The only thing he was sure of was that his life wouldn’t be any more normal tomorrow.