Authors Notes: Been reading far too much Game of Thrones and Pauline Gedge lately, so the idea of exploring Queen Amidala's two-faced character a little further than what the movies gave us was starting to nag me. I'm staying true to canon, so here are a few facts: Padmé was thirteen during the Phantom Menace. Also, before being elected queen she was "Princess" (mayor) of Theed. After the victory, she was offered the chance of staying queen and therefore creating a new dynasty, resurrecting the 'hereditary monarchy' in which her son would rule after her, etc. The last hereditary monarchy fizzled out a thousand years ago, which was when monarchs started to be elected. In canon she refused, but here, she accepts. Which makes things a lot more complicated for Anakin (and Obi-wan, but you didn't hear that).

Rated M, because there will definately be smut later on. Delicately written though- I try as hard as possible not to sound crude.
Thanks for reading! Criticism would be very nice. :)

•1•

The crackling was like a terrible laughter, flakes of pitiless amusement coughed from the raw throat of Fate. She could feel the sweat trickling down between her shoulder blades, seeping beneath the corset and following the line of her spine. Head bowed, eyes dried by the heat, she listened to the lament of the tenors, cavernous melody interspersed by the cracking and shuddering of burnt wood steadily falling apart.

She wondered what it felt like, for those who were sensitive to the Force, to lose someone dear; worse, to lose a master. She'd always been intrigued by the sorts of bonds one might develop once initiated in the arts of that particular spirituality. She had such large things to worry about – such large numbers, endless numbers, that she'd almost forgotten what it felt like to be entirely latched onto someone, and the raw, visceral pain that ensued when that someone was ripped away from you.

She risked a glance over at Kenobi, trying to see his face beneath the heavy hood, trying to see his expression. These men who had fought for her- she would've loved to know them better, to harbour other feelings than the noble kind that she seemed to harbour for absolutely everything. Caring, but detached. Objective. Rational. Queenly.

She breathed in the sweet, acrid scent of burnt wood, bringing up her chin and trying to raise her eyelids a little higher despite the stinging heat. The charred, blackened remains of what had been the Master's face grinned eerily up at the ceiling, sending volutes of smoke whirling all around, enveloping her slender physique, and it was like a whisper – silly girl, yearning for the vanity of grief, the selfishness of tears. Do not mourn insincerely.

How did it go again? There is no emotion…

The knight was weeping. And she caught herself in her envy as she looked at him, all swathed in his heavy layers yet unable to hide the fiery glints as they shone from beneath his lowered lashes. She yearned to reach out and take his hand… just to experience the gesture. Just to share- or rather, to steal what he was going through.

The flames sent their deadly homage through the Master's hollow ribcage, smoke unfurling elegantly, particles of ash whispering through the fingers of her empty hands... and the dead laughed on.

• • •

No one had ever seen such a gathering of Gungans and humans in the Great Hall of the Naboo palace since a true, dynastic King sat on the throne. You could've bathed in the sheer quantity of wine – enough to fill a small lake, surely – and the noise of clattering cutlery and laughter was deafening.

Queen Amidala was surrounded by her royal advisory Council as well as several high members of court and princes of different Naboo regions (including Gungan equivalents). The Jedi who had been present at the celebration had retired - only the Knight and his padawan had stayed, probably more to witness whatever might happen to Naboo's monarchy rather than just because they'd wanted to stay for the food. The Chancellor had also retired, apparently having thought it appropriate to leave since his purpose there was at an end. The Queen didn't seem the least perturbed by this refusal of attendance, but everybody knew she was rather suspicious of him after the way he'd practically manipulated her during the war as though she had no political conscience of her own, so no one had commented on it. Rumor had it that it was actually the Queen herself who had sent him away. Officially though, his presence at the celebration had been sufficient.

They were seated at a high table that overlooked the two long tables where the royal guests were seated from its raised dais. Rich, gold-tinted bunches of lace tumbled from her shoulders and fluttered airily whenever she moved- she was a sight to behold, mask-like face set against a translucent aureole that practically glowed in the last rays of sunlight pouring through the high windows.

Her court officials never let themselves be intimidated by her wardrobe, but tonight it seemed not only the wine but the victory was making them forget themselves – tonight, she was being treated as though she really was an exalted monarch of old.

"Not even the great unification of the Naboo peoples saw such unanimous and festive acclamations," one tall, balding man was saying, waving his goblet about, "It is time, I say! The people are all shouting for the same thing."

"The people are an impulsive mass." Sio Bibble, Head of the advisory council, seemed to be keeping a cool head as usual, though his icy eyes gleamed with excitement. "They've been shouting for the rebirth of many ancestral traditions, not all of which would sit well with the Republican sense of civilized cultures."

There was a general laugh at that, quickly interrupted by hot tempers.

"Your Majesty, no Republican clause can reproach us for trying to keep our culture alive." This time it was Lufta Shif, education adviser, a slender reed of a woman in puffy cream robes that was almost standing up as she leaned towards the Queen. "The resurrection of a hereditary monarchy would bring us one step closer to the golden age – the age of the great Kings and Queens of the Jafan dynasty. Who has not ridden under the great stone relics that still stand guard in the forests of Naboo? Who does not have ancestral treasures still fiercely loved and protected?"

"Her Majesty is young!" shouted a handsome regional prince, neck bulging and red with anger, "I doubt she will see the profit in bowing to the reactionary dribble of nostalgics. There is so much to expand upon after this, and you would have us slide back a thousand years?"

"You are young, also," Shif shot back coldly, "and perhaps do not wholly grasp the importance of upholding tradition."

"Naboo needs to rebuild itself, to gain independence, credibility. The Jafan dynasty were ever slaves to the Republic, just as we were up till now. Declaring Her Majesty as royal-blooded is certainly not the priority here!"

"I would advise you pick a better choice of words next time, my prince," Bibble roared over the clamour that ensued, "We have never been so dependent as to be called slaves, not even by those who would have us break away from the Republic."

•

A few seats away, Anakin Skywalker was staring at Amidala without paying the slightest bit of attention to the politicians' bickering. His new master had told him what he thought of politicians, and seeing them all so taken by their own ideals that they didn't even wait for their Queen to answer them, he had to say he agreed. They weren't even touching their food, which made him want to snatch their plates since Obi-wan had forbidden him a third helping ("You must learn moderation.") Their food was surely cold by now, but they didn't seem to mind - they drank enough wine to compensate anyway. Perhaps wine was the food of intellectuals? Oh well, he was happy to stick to the sizzling red meats and thick sauces that abounded everywhere on the white-clad tables – to hell with thinking too much. Amidala caught his eye precisely because she wasn't voicing any thoughts… beside the fact that she was unbearably beautiful in the dying light. To think that it was the same person who'd slouched beside him in the common room of the Naboo cruiser, who'd slid a blanket around his shoulders, who'd spoken with him using simple words, simple affections… who'd looked at him and cracked a smile despite the icy heights of her position… who'd –

"You keep looking at her like that, you'll make her face-paint start dribbling."

He whirled around to see a smug pair of juice-slick lips smiling down at him. (So much for the 'moderation' statement.)

"So what do you think, my very young apprentice?"

Anakin's eyes went round. "What? About what?"

The knight leaned in a little. "About whether or not Padme should stay Queen of Naboo."

Anakin squinted at him suspiciously.

"Is this a test?"

"Not really. I'm just curious."

Anakin refrained from spouting 'I doubt that', not wanting to make things more awkward than they already were. The former slave hadn't known his master for long, barely a few days really, but he could see that his master's mind was so cluttered that there seemed to be a restricted amount of room for him in there. Since Obi-wan's knighthood ceremony, both of them had entered a sort of phase where they'd prod at each other as if nothing was awkward, as if they were getting to know each other like any master and apprentice would… all the while trying to ignore the fact that their whole relationship was based on a promise made to a dead man.

"I think she'd make a great queen." He actually couldn't imagine her otherwise. Well, perhaps he could imagine her in more casual situations… but there was still this mystical sort of energy that emanated from her, the kind that you feel when setting eyes upon foreign royalty – such a wealth of exotic tradition and knowledge withheld behind an exquisite physical façade... Everything about her inspired awe. In his opinion, anyway.

"Bear in mind that staying Queen means the start of a dynasty. Suitors, prince regents, keepers of the divine intention."

"Suitors?" Anakin frowned. He'd never heard of all this – child slaves with an education were quite rare on Tatooine after all, if not inexistent. Still, he hated admitting that he had such restricted knowledge of things outside his own duties, even if no one could blame him.

"Men that will want to marry her out of opportunism. You know, to make alliances, to share territory and authority…"

Anakin stared at him, making his master grin a decidedly boyish grin.

"That's not really the most important thing though," he said lightly, his tone clearly suggesting that he knew just how important it was to Anakin.

Anakin would have kicked him if there weren't so many people around. Obi-wan was taking his reverence for some kind of childish crush and he wouldn't have that. He wasn't – wasn't childish. He opened his mouth to retort -

"Your Majesty, surely you could talk some sense into this young wine-addled fool," an old man was saying in an oily voice as he leaned over the table, brocade sleeves trailing in his plate. Anakin's head snapped around, completely forgetting what they'd been talking about as he contemplated the red and white mask of the Queen, watching for any sign of it cracking as he'd seen it crack for him.

The Queen smiled, black eyes glimmering in lukewarm amusement.

"What emerges from lips that have embraced the rim of a wine cup are not to be taken so seriously, Senator," she said in the same smooth, oily voice that he'd heard every wise old man use around the table. "Tonight you may let loose your tongues; I will not fall upon you in a righteous rage. Just remember that there is always a morning after… and that I am still sober."

That got a smattering of laughter, and though Anakin couldn't see what was funny he smiled anyway – only, when the Queen turned to him for the first time that night, she was still smiling that awfully cold smile, and his became rather forced. He trembled under the impulse of running up to her and rubbing all the white from her face.

• • •

Red, pulsing, ominous. The will of mutual destruction so omnipresent that it feels like they're both dead already. The master lies to the side, broken, and all he can do is scream and struggle against the truth. No. No! NO!

Bodies disengaging, twirling so fast for the sake of keeping true to combat forms that their feet are practically off the ground – he can feel nothing save the floating tendrils in the Force, framing the space that his master used to occupy - and something else, something so enormous that it impedes on his very vision and turns the world crimson.

Sabres clash with so much force that you'd think they'd slip through each other, being incorporeal laser. He pushes against the opponent's blade so ferociously that he begins to feel the other blade trembling – or is it his? His lips are curled in an ugly grimace of unadulterated hatred and he glares into the eyes of the Sith - surely the intent is enough to make those eyes physically shrivel and turn to black – but then his enemy backs down, escapes, and they're dancing again, except this time there's no form. No choreography. No art whatsoever, unless mindless murder counts as such.

The sabres clash, clash, rebound off of one another until you can't tell the blue from the red, and the robes are spinning spinning – the padawan lets the rage tear his lips apart, vomiting anger in wretched syllables. His master would have disapproved. What's that? His master's dead.

Red overpowers blue, and he's dangling. Oh no you don't. Fingers claw at life out of pure desire for revenge. The emptiness below him doesn't even scare him because it's gotten inside him too, it's what propels him upwards – he tugs at the Force as though groping at strings, almost falling through the gaps that his master has left – but he manages to find the weapon. Kill. Kill. Kill.

He leaps… he screams.

Green heat swipes through flesh. But there is no satisfaction. Of course not.

The dead are weeping, he can feel it, but he can only suck air into this dried cocoon of a body, shocked into numbness. Eyes wide, chest heaving as his enemy's body splits, the red mouth hanging open in surprise more than pain… he contemplates how vague the notion of 'death' is beyond the obvious corporeal immobility. Because how can we prove that we have attained death if our bodies keep on going without us? He is sure this is death, even if his blood is still running thick through his veins, his sweat still trickling down his forehead, his throat still burning. How else could he define the numbness, the cold dread?...

• • •

Her eyes were shining with excitement.

"Can you even imagine, Sabé? After a thousand years, the ice being broken, the proposition being made…"

The faithful handmaiden was helping her Queen undress after the feast, bustling around with garments and jewellery draped on her forearms. Padme was sitting at her gold-encrusted dressing table, wiping the paint from her face in little trembling swipes.

"I would've thought you'd be more intimidated by the proposition," Sabé said hesitantly, always striving to please her mistress and to show her that she'd been right in choosing her as the favourite, the royal decoy. The most trusted of the maidens had to earn the position, and she was constantly renewing the effort.

"I am intimidated, of course I am- I'd be a fool to consider it as one considers accepting jewellery or some such respectful homage." She was gabbling excitedly, having reverted back to Padmé, back to the thirteen-year-old girl whose fingers barely peeped out of the too-wide sleeves, whose lips trembled when the slick red had been wiped away.

Sabé was older than she was, and the only thing that could get in the way of her reverence for the Queen was the fact that she was more mature as a woman – and therefore was infinitely more down-to-earth when it came to base human relations and what it meant to accede to adulthood on the most primal of levels – something that the sweet virginal queen could not even fathom despite all that political and economical genius.

"Padmé," the faithful handmaiden said, striding around to settle her perfumed palms on the Queen's shoulders. "How many other queens do you know of, who rule by themselves?"

The Queen looked puzzled by the question. For the past few centuries there had been a tendency to elect Queens, and so it was not such an alien notion here on Naboo.

"Not all queens have to be part of a royal couple to rule."

"Padmé, you cannot morph the entire system into a matriarchy," Sabé said with infinite patience, "Restoring a hereditary monarchy reopens the possibility for royal intergalactic alliances, if we truly follow tradition. Which would place a whole new world of duties and trouble on you."

"Trouble," Padmé echoed with a laugh. "You think my queendom has been a piece of cake up till now?"

"That's what I'm trying to say!" Sabé exclaimed, "Imagine having an entire other planet at your charge!" And ruling alongside a man. But neither of them could really imagine that.

"But I wouldn't be alone to take care of all that, would I?"

Oh, you certainly won't be alone. Sabé sighed. "I was just telling you to consider that as well, seeing as you seem to be thinking more of tradition and history than reality."

"Have I ever been unrealistic?" Padmé said, seemingly fluffing up indignantly. "I mean, what's so difficult to consider about having to marry? I was thinking about what it would mean when it comes to my duties – seeing as royalty would become my life." Sabé looked down at her almost pityingly- at 13, no young girl could truly consider a life-time proposition seriously. "Everything would take on a more religious aspect, wouldn't it? I was wondering how being sacrosanct would change the manner of ruling, the daily interactions, all that. I mean, the Jafan kings and queens were considered demigods - but everyone knows I was just a princess like any other a few months back. How on Naboo is any type of divine status ever going to be recognized?"

"You will probably receive a divine blessing." Sabé shrugged. "The founder of the Jafan dynasty made himself king after ending the Gungan-Naboo war- perhaps you should look up how he went about obtaining divinity."

Padmé craned her neck to gaze up at her handmaiden, sensing a certain nonchalance about the whole thing.

"You sound like you know I'll just end up turning down the proposition," she said slowly. "But you know, I'm not going to make the decision in one night- nor am I making the decision by myself."

She turned around again, eyes locking with those in her reflection. She had come to loathe her physical appearance without face-paint; it make her feel naked, stripped of credibility. Those pale pink lips, the wide innocent-looking eyes, the round, childish cheeks… she turned her eyes to the jewellery strewn carelessly over the tabletop.

"Padmé…"

"You know you can speak freely with me, Sabé," the Queen soothed her friend, not for the first time since they'd started the whole decoy collaboration.

"I think… I think you may be too young to realize what a life-long position such a Queen can truly - "

Sabé had anticipated that glare, that pained, betrayed look; the Queen stood, wrenching away from her handmaiden's fingers before standing there for a spell as if unsure of what to do. It was almost heartbreaking to see it, that hesitation, that childish loss for words – but then she was taking long steady strides toward the wide mirror that stood by her bed.

"I need to talk about this with someone neutral. Someone who doesn't have an influence over the Naboo seat of power at all - but who is still trustworthy, of course. Someone who appreciates what I have done for the Naboo people already, and who recognizes the ruling quality that has apparently won me this honour."

The handmaiden followed her queen, head bowed in apology. It had been an inappropriate thing to say, of course – but someone had to say it. She knew that the queen's greatest insecurity was her lack of experience due to young age, and the terrible thing was that there was no way of remedying that except actually bringing about those experiences, waiting for the time to pass. And of course, there is nothing more infuriating than a remedy that takes years to come into effect. She'd have to suffer the doubt of others for years to come.

Seeing that Padmé had outstretched her arms, the handmaiden stood behind her and began the tricky task of unwinding the elaborate undergarment to replace it with proper night garb. Sabé stayed silent, waiting for the answer to come to her queen regarding who she should talk to – there were scant few to choose from with such criteria. Silently she pulled at the thin ropes, undid the gold tassels, and peeled the folds away one by one until all that was left was the slight body of Naboo's youngest ruler.

The two girls looked at the reflection, Padmé staring steadily, Sabé glancing rather furtively so as not to show disrespect. Their impressions, however, were identical: both saw the bony knees, the budding breasts, the slight dip of the waist… one could only think of the word nubile when presented with such a sight. Sabé knew how Padmé would comfort herself; the young girl would tell herself that it was better to have an adult mind and a childish body than the opposite, and that it was with her mind that she ruled, not her young bosom or her flawless skin. But, Sabé thought sadly, the Queen would surely see just how wrong she was once tradition was restored, and with it, the true status and rights of a Naboo Queen.

• • •

"Master?"

Something was pulling at him… the crimson swirled stubbornly – no, wait, I'm not finished… everything turned to grey dregs and finally collapsing to reveal the comforting black of his closed eyelids. He'd meant to stay there, to make things right, to pick himself apart so that he might learn how not to react like that ever again – but it was still such a vibrant memory that he could almost feel the slippery metal against his palms, the braid's lash on his cheeks after so much spinning. How could he work on it, when the subject itself deconstructed the effort?

The Knight waited until his racing heartbeat calmed a little, before cracking his eyes open to find a little boy standing in front of him in the morning light, a hand on his wrist.

"Anakin?"

The boy had a huge grin on his face, despite his eyes being all puffy from sleep. With an inward sigh the knight realized this was another night he'd have to catch up on.

"Pad- I mean, the queen has commanded that we join her for breakfast," said the boy in a silly deep voice.

"…What?"

Obi-wan forced his eyes to open a little wider, looking towards the door where he found an elegantly dressed herald staring straight at him.

"The Queen has a few things she would like to discuss with you in private," the herald said. "Please, come. This is a great honour."

Obi-wan looked at his padawan and hoped his thoughts of, why ask for both of us? weren't too apparent in his gaze.

"Alright. Lead the way."

• • •