AN: Written for darknightdestiny and previously published at my LiveJournal. Takes place sometime during Return of the Jedi.

The Priorities of Princesses

There was the sound of something metal on metal, then a "Chewie!" followed by some colorful Corellian slang.

A smile, as Leia thought, That's him.

No, a low drawl and a tease, a grin and a blaster—that's what he was. And a smirk—oh, the smirks—the man had a whole catalog of them. Hard not to notice when they were invading her personal space half of the time. And after a bounty, a crypt of frozen carbon and a too-bright desert with teeth, he, they, all of him were finally hers.

Her boots on the ladder to the lower gun turret announced her presence. When she reached the bottom, a lop-sided grin was waiting for her.

"You're not Chewie," he said.

Right hand on right hip, toss of the old braids—that was her. And she was still royalty, after all, despite the fact that she was crowded between the ladder and his body, despite the fact that she had never felt more vulnerable in her need to love.

"You sound disappointed," Leia remarked, trying not to pout. She wasn't that kind of princess.

"I will be if you didn't bring a hydrospanner with you," he said. Then his mouth twitched.

Smirk No. 4: The Smartass. "Well, what if I brought you something else?" she asked.

"Yeah?" The smirk vanished, replaced by a smuggler's appraisal. "What're we talking here?"

"Oh, maybe a little of this." A reach and a tug and he was flush against her, belly-to-belly. "And this." Her arms hooked around the back of his neck. She smiled up at him.

"I think I like where this conversation is headed," he said.

Smirk No. 2: The Crooked. Her knees turned to jelly.

If she hadn't been his already, she'd be signing over the deed now. But since she was, she had something else on her mind, something that had kept her going during the nights of spare hope, something she thought she might never get to have.

Him. This moment.

The hydrospanner and the rest of the universe could wait.