Archive: M_A, SWA-L
Archive Date: March 15, 2003
Category: First-time, drama, romance
Disclaimer: George Lucas owns these lads, and would disapprove greatly of the uses I put them to, I'm sure. But they're just so *tempting*
Feedback: All welcomed, as negative or positive as you care for.
Notes: This story was first published in the zine 'Rituals and Meditations', and if you want a copy with artwork, go smile at the editors. This version differs a little from the zine version, and for that I want to thank Lori, who gave me the most insightful feedback I've ever had on a story - and then said, 'Well? Are you going to change it?'
They go on forever. I'm a magpie, and I've stolen ideas, names and inspiration from Saraid, Keelywolfe, Blu Heron, Judith Proctor and Rana Eros. Rough drafts of this were very kindly beta'd under pressure by Writestuff, and The Emu, without whose input I'd have been hopelessly lost and would never have finished. RavenD drew me an image from a rough description of one paragraph, ages ago; Mark, Lorrie, Master Ruth and Russet all corrected me, cheered me and kept me going. Most of all, Gail Riordan was just the best editrix a writer could have. She cajoled me with her own artwork, kept faith in the story and even held the zine back for it, while never making me feel as guilty as I should have been. Thank you all.
Pairing: Q/O
Rating: NC-17
Spoilers: None.
Summary: The Ritual of Acquiescence proves difficult for both Padawan and Master.
Warnings: None, oddly enough.

~~~~~Definitions~~~~~

Ko: an ancient Chinese measure of time, which varied over the centuries from a fifth to a quarter of an hour.
Compay: Cuban slang for 'compadre', friend.
Compay segundo: thus means second friend, but it is also used to mean second voice, or harmony in a duet. Hence, its adoption as a nickname by the most famous 'son' musician in Cuba, Compay Segundo.

Qui-Gon's voice was unruffled, calm. Even Obi-Wan, who knew him so much better than most, couldn't detect any disturbance in the bigger man.

He couldn't pretend to such normality, so he said nothing as he stepped over to the large, wooden desk. The sun shone into his eyes through the wide window in front of him as he stood there, fumbling with the catches to his leggings. He'd stripped for many friends before, if never for his master, but this time an unfamiliar clumsiness impeded him.

"Shall I take off my boots?" He was pleased that he managed the sentence without his voice cracking; he'd even matched Qui-Gon's prosaic tone.

"No need. The heels will help, given the difference in our heights. In fact, I should take mine off instead."

While Qui-Gon was turned away undoing the catches on his own boots, Obi-Wan took the opportunity to push down his leggings till they bunched around his knees, keeping his back to his master. "You don't believe in much ceremony, do you?"

Qui-Gon chuckled. "I'd hardly have thought this required formalities, Padawan. Right, are you ready?"

Obi-Wan bent over, resting his forearms on the wood. It was warm from the sunshine, rich with the smell of beeswax. He closed his eyes so he didn't have to see his own face reflected in the highly polished surface.

"Spread your legs a little wider." Qui-Gon's voice came from close behind. Obediently, he shuffled his knees further apart in the tangle of cloth.

"That's better. Tell me if the jelly is too cold, Obi-Wan." A slightly antiseptic smell wafted toward Obi-Wan, then one finger slipped between the cheeks of his bottom, smearing lubricant around the opening to his anal passage.

It was chill, but he answered quickly, "That's fine," then bit his lip as Qui-Gon began to push the finger in.

"Just relax, Padawan. This isn't too bad, is it?"

"No, Master." He knew he hadn't managed to keep the strain from his voice when Qui-Gon laid one large, warm hand on the small of his back under his tunic, and began to stroke in soothing circles.

"Stop me if I'm going too fast," Qui-Gon said, mild concern in his voice.

"It's alright, Qui-Gon."

"Hmmph." But Qui-Gon did not push the issue, much to Obi-Wan's relief. His master was silent for the next few minutes, slowly penetrating the sphincter which opened reluctantly under his touch. Obi-Wan tried to ignore the sensation, reciting mentally his schedule for the rest of the day, his plans for the evening...

"I'm going to put in another finger now, Obi-Wan. Tell me if anything hurts, even in the slightest," Qui-Gon said gently.

There was more cool jelly, and then the pressure against the ring of his anus increased. It was uncomfortable, but Obi-Wan had no intention of bringing this to a halt.

Once he had gained entry, Qui-Gon began to flex his fingers, titillating the host of nerve endings just inside. He slid in and out, spreading his fingers till Obi-Wan finally felt a soft-coiled arousal stir in his belly. Involuntarily, he arched on his toes, pushing against Qui-Gon's hand.

"Good, that's it." Qui-Gon's approval was as stimulating as his hand. "One more now, and then we'll get it over with."

Another thick finger entered him and he clenched his fists. It wasn't pain, but his body was not happy either, and that despite the fact that, for a nineteen year old, his range of sexual experience was reasonably wide. He didn't think his master would hurt him, yet the sexual stimulation Qui-Gon was giving him hadn't quite managed to banish the sick feeling in his stomach.

But this was what they were here to do; best to get it over with as fast as possible. He drove himself back against Qui-Gon, pushing up to his master's knuckles in one swift thrust that drew a gasp from him and a hiss of surprise from Qui-Gon.

"Easy, Obi-Wan! Not so fast."

"I thought you said it wouldn't take very long," he spoke through clenched teeth.

"We have as much time as you need." Qui-Gon was clearly worried now, withdrawing his fingers back to the first knuckle.

"I want you to do it, Qui-Gon," he lied. "Please would you stroke me some more?" It had been better when he let his body take over, responding to his master's practiced touch.

"Of course, Padawan," Qui-Gon complied willingly, twisting his fingers slowly round in the tight channel. Obi-Wan noticed, however, that the hand at the base of his spine had shifted to stop him making any more sudden movements backward.

He lowered his forehead to the desk, breathing shallowly as those fingers caressed him, sliding gently in and out, a little deeper each time. It wasn't long till Qui-Gon nudged his prostate, sending a shower of sparks through his body. He gave a low moan.

"Yes. Let me do that again for you." The restless fingers brushed over the tender spot once more, and Obi-Wan thrust his hips back, vaguely realising that the restraining hand had gone. He was much looser, the physical discomfort almost gone -- but something still felt wrong. Something was missing, something was out of place, and his stomach was beginning to knot up again, but not with lust.

Qui-Gon was finger-fucking him steadily now, building up a rhythm of quicker strokes interspersed with long, slow movements mimicking the ones Obi-Wan expected when he was finally entered. Against the curve of his buttock, he could feel Qui-Gon's penis, swollen to a fullness he could only guess at. But it wouldn't be so bad, he was sure. It would soon be over.

"Are you ready, Obi-Wan?" Qui-Gon's voice was hoarser than before. At his padawan's affirmative grunt, he slowly manouevred his fingers out of Obi-Wan, letting the puckered opening wink shut. "I just need some more lubricant."

Obi-Wan stayed still, face hidden on the curve of his arms. He listened for the small sounds coming from behind him, of Qui-Gon loosening the fastenings on his leggings, of the cap of the tube clicking shut. The sunlight shone warm upon his back, painting a lozenge of heat along his spine. In the darkness of his closed eyes, bright-coloured spirals swirled, a magic kaleidoscope. If he could just concentrate on them for the next few minutes, and forget what was going on...

Qui-Gon's hands settled on the cheeks of his bottom, wide thumbs spreading them apart. He felt a sudden rush of cool spill down his crack as the lubricant there was exposed to the air. Then something large and blunt pressed against the newly-stretched ring of his anus, cold jelly slicked over a hot hardness.

Qui-Gon's penis.

Qui-Gon let go of his hips, hands coming down on the desk to either side of Obi-Wan as he braced himself. Something feather-light brushed against Obi-Wan's neck. He felt a puff of air tickle the tiny hairs there as Qui-Gon's voice said right behind him, "Now, Obi-Wan," and then that cobra-headed cock thrust against him, gaining first entry.

Obi-Wan's eyes flew open. The tip of his master's member was lodged in him, but the ring surrounding it was contracting fast, trying to expel it. Desperately he tried to summon the control to relax it, but he couldn't. He heard Qui-Gon grunt behind him, felt the big body shift position slightly, muscles coiling, then the powerful surge--

He cried out as the heavy cock knifed into his tightly resisting body.

"Obi-Wan!" Qui-Gon pulled back immediately, and Obi-Wan collapsed on the desk, stomach flat on the hard surface. "Are you alright?" Worry harshened the words, but Obi-Wan could not answer them. Icy waves were travelling up his spine: he had broken out into a sweat beneath his tunics and his anus was clenching in spasms that left him shuddering.

Qui-Gon's hand returned to his lower back, massaging the rigid muscles there. "I am so sorry, Obi-Wan. I thought you were fully prepared--"

"I was," Obi-Wan interrupted raggedly. "I don't know why it surprised me, but it won't be so much of a shock again. Could we continue, please, Master?"

"I don't think that would be wise," Qui-Gon withdrew his hand and stepped back. "Pull up your leggings, Padawan."

"No, Qui-Gon, don't stop! I want to get this over with!"

"Pull up your leggings and go and wash yourself. Do as I say, Padawan." Obi-Wan hadn't heard Qui-Gon's voice so quiet and implacable for a long time.

Catching his breath in short, jerky gasps, Obi-Wan pushed himself up from the desk, dully noting the sweaty palmprints he had left on the gleaming surface. Qui-Gon was already walking towards the kitchen, no doubt to wash himself there. Holding the catch for his leggings in one hand, Obi-Wan fled down the hall to the lavabo they normally shared.

Force, that had been disastrous. Sitting down on the seat of the pissoir, leggings discarded on the floor, he winced at a sharp reminder of the force his master had just unleashed against his body. His wretchedly unwilling body.

Where in all the heavens had that come from? It wasn't even as if he were unaroused, though a few of his friends had admitted to no sexual response during the entire procedure. Oh, his master would tear strips off him. To be so unaware of what his body was saying as to let Qui-Gon hurt him... And, earlier, he had deliberately misled his master about his level of preparedness. He had had ample opportunity this morning to voice any misgivings which might have led to this fiasco. No, Qui-Gon would not be pleased.

Now he had some idea of what this Ritual was meant to test. How could he have been so blind to his own concerns about it?

He'd been like that rather stupid tribe they had come across on Tremansis IV, inhabiting a valley near the nesting site of a pack of carnivorous wyvers. They denied all knowledge of the beast, could not recognise its spoor along the forest tracks, interpreted its cries in the night as those of hunting birds. And if their children vanished on the way back from the fields, or if a hunter failed to return from a foray into the jungle, they told tales of ogres on the mountain, and invented lies about the habits of neighbouring clans. All not to recognise what they were truly living in the midst of.

He'd known he would have to do this ever since he became sexually awakened; in fact, he had known it from rumour long before. But when he was fourteen Qui-Gon had sat down with him and explained it in detail, answering his questions patiently. Yes, he would put his cock into Obi-Wan, but only when Obi-Wan had completed all the intermediate katas. No, he didn't expect this to be before Obi-Wan was twenty-one, at least. He'd been two years off, as it turned out -- or had he deliberately given Obi-Wan a later age so he wouldn't worry if he landed up behind schedule?

Qui-Gon had reassured him that it shouldn't hurt; by then, Obi-Wan would probably have had a lot of practice at it. (His master had got the second part correct, but in the first, he'd been sadly mistaken.) All the human padawans did it, Qui-Gon confirmed, even the ones with female masters. They used a dildo -- an artificial cock; Obi-Wan would find out about those, too, as he got older. (And he had.) Qui-Gon had even said that many of the non-human padawans performed the Ritual as well, if they came from species who included penetration in their mating rituals, and for whom it held psychological significance. Other Jedi species had other rituals, some testing mental states too alien for even Qui-Gon to grasp.

He remembered questioning the concept of 'psychological significance'; and the ensuing assignment Qui-Gon had set for him, perusing semiotics texts for the ways in which various humanoid cultures had symbolised the sexual act. The idea of his master penetrating him hadn't worried him at the time: it was just one of the many tests padawans went through on the long journey to knighthood.

And after that initial surge of curiosity, Obi-Wan had rarely considered the Ritual at all. It wasn't too long before he was researching into the practice of penetration of his own accord -- and, in due course, concentrating on the application of his studies with his normal intense focus. If the thought that his master would one day have sex with him had occurred then, it wasn't very important. Didn't he have sex all the time?

He was more circumspect now, but he got in enough regular practice to make his reaction a few minutes ago even more perplexing. Perhaps Qui-Gon's casual attitude to the whole thing had sparked off some deep-seated anxiety. He'd been sitting at the breakfast table, yawning and dishevelled, watching his master cooking on the wide range when the subject came up...

The big hands had virtually engulfed an egg as Qui-Gon cracked it against the side of a cup.

"You did that last kata very well, Obi-Wan. I've talked to the training master, and we've agreed that your formal lessons can end now."

A glow of accomplishment had filled his sleepy brain. From now on he would train with Qui-Gon alone, their time spent in teamwork on missions; there was no more need for courses at Temple with other masters. He would also start to assume more responsibility from Qui-Gon, giving greater input into the missions under his master's guidance.

He would be a senior padawan, at last.

"It's at just the right time, Obi-Wan. The Council wants to post me to Malabar, to keep a discreet eye on the disarmament process there."

"That's going to be a long, nasty job, Master."

"Perhaps as much as a Standard Revolution."

"A full year?" Obi-Wan looked up, startled. "The Council's willing to assign a Master like you there for a year?" Qui-Gon's many successes in the field, both on his own and later with Obi-Wan in tow, had spread his name far beyond Jedi circles. He was now the Chancellor's obvious choice for any mission where the Senate wanted to show they meant business. But a discreet eye was Senate parlance for undercover work. To have Qui-Gon -- and his formidable reputation -- effectively hors-de-combat for an entire year must mean the Council took the situation on Malabar very seriously.

"The civil wars there have finally deteriorated to the stage where they threaten the stability of that whole sector," Qui-Gon replied. "The Senate has managed to get agreement from the four main governments for a ceasefire, but Mace's intelligence shows that the concentration of heavy weaponry is increasing even while disarmament supposedly takes place. Various of the factions are also beginning to plunder nearby planets to finance their arms purchases. The mining operations on Dinuvia have already suffered two disruptions to production from raids in the last quarter."

"I could see why the Senate might be concerned about that," Obi-Wan said, pouring cold juice into a glass.

Qui-Gon was adding odd ingredients to the eggs, his hands deft as he sorted through the various jars in the cupboard. "Their concerns are justified. The price of Dinuvian crystal is already rising on the materials markets. If the situation continues, it won't be long before other commodity prices increase, too. The situation on Malabar must be contained, if not settled. Preferably, for good."

"If you managed that, Qui-Gon, you'd be famous all over the galaxy," Obi-Wan said, a hint of envy in his voice.

"That's hardly relevant," Qui-Gon said in casual dismissal, waving the salt cannister over the eggs.

Obi-Wan bridled at that. "If I could be known as the one who saved an entire planet from the war it had been wallowing in for centuries, I would consider it a worthy memorial, Master."

Qui-Gon frowned. "You're assuming anyone would be grateful for it, Padawan. In my experience, civil war breeds only bitterness, even in its ending. And Malabar is a very embittered place."

Obi-Wan sipped his juice as he watched Qui-Gon beat the eggs briskly. Inwardly, he was grimacing at the idea of a year on a planet that was nothing more than a war zone, surrounded by treacherous ingrates. He'd thought their recent assignments taxing; this sounded to be much worse. "Weren't you posted there with Xanatos once?"

It was a moment before Qui-Gon replied. "Yes, Xani came with me." He paused to rinse off the fork he'd used on the eggs. "That must have been twelve years ago. It wasn't a Senate mission, though; the Council sent us in an unofficial capacity to bolster local groups trying to establish safe havens for refugees. It came to very little, but I still have valuable contacts there, who'd be willing to pass me off as a mercenary for hire. That should get me into the circles who are building up the weapons caches."

Qui-Gon sighed as he set the skillet to temperature. "It's going to be a very isolated mission, Padawan. Contact with the Temple won't be easy: anything that endangers my cover must be minimised."

"Your cover?" Obi-Wan finally noticed that Qui-Gon wasn't referring to them both. "Surely I'm coming with you?"

The note of indignant query had Qui-Gon smiling. He poured the mixture into the pan, stirring it attentively as Obi-Wan tore a hunk of bread from the fresh, hot loaf.

"Well, it's not the assignment I would have chosen to start your senior padawanship with, but the Council has little choice in the matter. I'm the best one to go, and they would prefer me to have somebody to guard my back. The only benefit is that, by the end of it, you will have gained very valuable experience." Which meant a mission even more difficult and gruelling than Obi-Wan had first thought. "As long as you've finished all the elements of your intermediate course, then yes, you will be free to come with me. You'd best submit that exercise in military logistics to Master Lao-Ma tomorrow morning. That's your last theoretical subject complete, isn't it?"

"Yes, Master."

Qui-Gon tossed the skillet with an apparently casual flip of the wrist, landing the eggs neatly on Obi-Wan's plate. "And can you wash yourself well after breakfast, Padawan? Particularly your genitals. I'd like to complete the Ritual of Acquiescence before you go off to classes."

"Master?"

"I believe it's the only one of the physical exercises we haven't covered." Qui-Gon turned away to put the unused eggs into coolstore. "It shouldn't take more than two ko. I'm due at a seminar on Ethical Dilemmas later this morning." He sat down opposite Obi-Wan, scooping a large chunk of mushroom onto his fork. "If that's alright by you."

"Oh, uh, of course, Master."

Qui-Gon laid down his fork, the mushroom left untasted. "Obi-Wan, do you have concerns about the Ritual? I know we haven't discussed it recently, but surely you realised you were close to that stage--"

Obi-Wan quickly interjected, "I hadn't thought about it much, to be honest. But it's no big issue. Today will be fine."

Qui-Gon relaxed back in his chair, a wry quirk to his lips. "It must be said there are advantages to having an experienced padawan, even if it does mean he comes in at three in the morning..."

"If you slept a little sounder, I wouldn't disturb you," Obi-Wan protested, rubbing sleeping dust from his eyes. It was too early for this conversation.

"If I slept a little sounder, we would both have been cremated on Gauda Prime." Qui-Gon's riposte was muffled by a forkful of egg. "Still, I'm glad you're not too nervous about this, Padawan. When I had to do it for Xani, it took me three days to calm him down enough so we could get through it. But he was a good two years younger than you."

"He'd got this far at seventeen?" Obi-Wan was frankly shocked. He'd considered himself well advanced as far as most of the human padawans went.

"He spent rather more of his adolescence working, and rather less socialising," Qui-Gon's voice was dry.

"No wonder he needed calming down. Doesn't sound like any fun at all," Obi-Wan muttered into his juice.

"No. No, he wasn't fun." Qui-Gon swallowed the last mouthful of egg, and put his knife and fork together. "Clear up for me, would you, Obi-Wan? I need to prepare my notes for this seminar. If you could be ready for the Ritual in, say, four ko?" Obi-Wan nodded agreement as Qui-Gon passed by his chair. "Don't eat too fast. The chickens aren't coming to reclaim those eggs, Padawan." A familiar hand ruffled his hair, and then Qui-Gon was gone, the door from the kitchen closing softly behind him.

Obi-Wan swallowed down the sick feeling in his stomach, and swept his uneaten plate of food into the recycler. What a morning to have a hangover.

Except it hadn't been a hangover. Washing himself thoroughly before he was due in Qui-Gon's study, Obi-Wan had become more and more nervous. Some small part of him was protesting that he simply did not want to do this. He'd told it to shut up. He'd reasoned with himself that this was hardly a major event. He was just going to be fucked by his master, that was all. It might take no more than a few minutes: all that was normally required was for Qui-Gon to enter him and ejaculate.

His master was a virile, sexually active man. Obi-Wan didn't see the attraction himself, but the older man didn't lack for partners. He was almost certainly a proficient lover; Qui-Gon was, after all, proficient at most things. He wouldn't hurt Obi-Wan.

But he had, and it had all been Obi-Wan's own fault.

Sucking in his breath between his teeth, he pushed his finger slowly into his entrance, sending a warming healing into the abused flesh. When he withdrew it, there was a slight tinge of blood. Oh, that had hurt a great deal. But his pride was about to hurt a lot more. Quickly rinsing the whole area to get rid of any trace of the jelly, Obi-Wan dressed in a fresh set of leggings and went to face his doom.

He found Qui-Gon washing his hands over the kitchen sink.

"Don't you have to leave for that seminar now, Master?"

"I've cancelled it." Qui-Gon's voice was flat as he dried his hands on a towel. "You and I have some things to discuss, Obi-Wan."

Uh oh. "I ought to start work on that exercise for Master Lao-Ma, to get it done by tomorrow. Couldn't we talk later this even--"

"Padawan."

"I suppose not. Alright, Master, I know I deserve to be told off," he said resignedly, and was surprised when Qui-Gon shook his head.

"Oh, Obi-Wan. Do you think I only want to scold you?"

He looked up at the sad expression on Qui-Gon's face as his master stood there, feet still bare on the cold stone floor, his hands held out to his padawan.

Obi-Wan took one step forward and was enfolded in his master's embrace. Burrowing into the layer of tunics surrounding the big, warm body, he whispered, "I'm sorry, Qui-Gon. I was so stupid -- "

"Hush, Padawan. It was my fault, too. I should have seen you were upset." Hands smoothed his hair, cradling his head. "Did I hurt you badly?"

"No, Master," his voice was muffled against the fine linen. "It was easy to heal."

Qui-Gon's hands tightened for a moment, then eased their grasp. "Come, Padawan. We do still have to talk about this -- and I want to stand somewhere warmer."

Obi-Wan gave a reluctant laugh. "I suppose we'd better move then, before I step on your toes."

Qui-Gon led him out into the sunroom, as they called the little ledge of balcony covered with glass to shelter it from the winds swirling around the high towers of the Temple. Despite knowing it was foolish, Obi-Wan was relieved that Qui-Gon hadn't chosen the study as the place to continue the conversation. They pulled cushions off the chairs and sat on the ground, legs crossed, facing each other.

"The Ritual of Acquiescence has a long history," Qui-Gon began, surprising Obi-Wan, who had expected a string of awkward questions to be launched at him. "Its exact significance is not clear, though most think of it as a ritual of submission. By allowing your body to be entered in so intimate a fashion, you are showing your complete submission to the authority of the Jedi order over you, just as you submit your heart and soul to them during your Trials. This is why girls undergoing the Ritual are also penetrated anally, rather than vaginally, thus emphasising the element of subjugation over the element of sexual stimulation. Or, so goes the theory."

"Which you don't accept." Obi-Wan was well-used to his master's methods of argument: whenever Qui-Gon mentioned theory, it was a foregone conclusion that he had his own, radically different interpretation.

"Now, Padawan, have I ever taken the simple line?"

Obi-Wan smiled even as he shook his head reprovingly. "Never, my Master."

"So, how much do you remember about the origins of the Ritual?" Qui-Gon asked.

This was where the inadequacies in Obi-Wan's preparation would be shown up. "Only that it's very old. Wasn't it already archaic when Master Tobian came across it?"

"Yes. According to the historian Horatius, the people of Dahometh still practised it then, but in a debased form: Tobian had to go back to much older texts to study it properly. The rite which was finally absorbed into the Jedi rituals reflects the older, more potent tradition. Dahometh culture had once been incredibly rich, though it had been decaying for many years when the Republic stumbled across the planet. They tended to madness, you know."

"Oh," Obi-Wan said.

Qui-Gon smiled. "That does not make their achievements less valuable, Padawan," he chided gently. "They have left us a great legacy, though sadly few amongst them can now even speak their own language, much less the archaic form the Ritual texts were written in. You have read a little of their later philosophers, haven't you?"

Obi-Wan wrinkled his nose. "A little. In the original Dahometh," he added hopefully, as Qui-Gon tutted in remonstrance. "And some translations of the Ritual texts. We covered Declan's thesis of its significance, too. She definitely saw it as a ritual of submission, Master; what is your view, if you don't accept hers?"

"The question is rather, what is yours?"

About to dash into a quick reply, Obi-Wan paused.

"I was telling the truth this morning, when I said I hadn't really thought about it," he finally answered.

Qui-Gon sighed. "It is true that some of these older, ritual exercises can be seen as rote learning. But, Padawan, if you approach them with nothing in your mind, then nothing is what you will get out of them, even though theoretically you have mastered them. Now, I know it is not possible to approach every exercise this way: we would none of us have reached knighthood if that were required."

This wry admission surprised Obi-Wan: Qui-Gon rarely gave less than his entire commitment to whatever they did, and expected the same from his padawan. Qui-Gon continued, "Inevitably, there will be some exercises that mean nothing to you, which you complete at a mechanical level only. But before consigning a ritual to this class, should you not have considered it in more detail?"

"I find it hard to explain my carelessness here, Master. I thought so little about it, that I wonder if I was ignoring the whole issue on purpose, blocking it out of my mind."

"Do you find it such a horrifying idea, Padawan?" Qui-Gon's voice was gentle as he reached out to brush a finger against Obi-Wan's chin. "I understand that my -- body size -- might seem a bit formidable..."

Obi-Wan had never heard Qui-Gon use a euphemism to him before. He immediately decided he didn't like it and wouldn't tolerate it. This was a discussion between adults, after all.

"No, Master, the fact that you have a big cock has nothing to do with it." Qui-Gon's grimace acknowledged the hit. "Your -- body size -- is very impressive, I'm sure, but I have had large enough experience now to cope." Their eyes met, Obi-Wan's daring Qui-Gon to challenge him on the point; but his master leant back, expression contemplative rather than combative.

"Then what else may have upset you?"

"It just felt wrong. I don't know. I -- you were so casual about the whole thing."

"I am sorry if you felt slighted, Padawan. I honestly didn't think formality here would be very important to you, given your large enough experience."

"I don't sleep around that much anymore," Obi-Wan said, somewhat defensively.

"That is just as well," Qui-Gon's voice was dry. "If you hadn't channelled some of that enthusiasm back towards your work, you would be nowhere near this level today."

"Yes. Well. I suppose that was the other thing, too." Qui-Gon looked questioning. "Your saying how much time you had taken with Xanatos."

"Ah."

"You said you spent three days preparing for the Ritual with him. I got about three minutes."

A frown passed over Qui-Gon's face. "To some extent, Padawan, that has been the outcome of circumstance. If it were not for the deadline for this mission... But you need not begrudge Xani that time. It took him much mental effort to accept the need for the Ritual at all; for him, it was very much an issue of submission, and a submission he found painful, at that." His master looked away, watching the craft wheeling in the sky around them. "You have never had his problems with authority, Padawan. Normally I would have expected you to be lecturing me about how important the Ritual was, to uphold Jedi tradition."

"It's not the idea of the Ritual itself that's upsetting me, Master," he said slowly. "It just feels as if something's wrong. As if it would be easy to get right, if I could find the answer. Like those pictures with hidden faces: once you've seen the face, you wonder how you could ever have missed it."

"Well, Obi-Wan, I fear you will have to spend much of today looking for that face. Our time is short, whether or no we would prefer it otherwise." Qui-Gon stretched his long limbs, then settled back onto his knees in his customary stance for meditation. "I want you to spend the next few hours exploring the significance of this Ritual for you, Padawan. But I want us to start by opening ourselves as much as we can to the auguries of the Force. It is possible, after all, that your reluctance stems from some foretelling of danger on this mission."

"I hadn't thought of that." Obi-Wan, too, settled himself into his favourite meditation pose, each ankle high on the thigh of the other leg. Qui-Gon normally claimed that his own legs were too long to make that position comfortable.

"It might be linked. After all, the one is dependent on the other. I will stay with you and meditate for now, but I must go to see the Council later this afternoon. Padawan," and here Qui-Gon sounded uncertain for the first time that day, "would you be willing to try again this evening, if your meditations fail to show any reason not to?"

"Of course! You said it yourself, Master. Our time is short."

"But you will tell me to stop if you need me to?"

"Yes, Master," Obi-Wan replied, abashed.

"Nor will you let me hurt you?"

"No, I won't." He was thoroughly ashamed of himself now.

"And, Obi-Wan," Qui-Gon caught his chin in one large hand, tilting his head up till their eyes met, "you won't betray my trust in you again?"

"No, Master," he whispered, desperately sorry for the pain he saw in that steady blue gaze.

"Good." His chin was released. "Now, let's to work -- or, rather, to thought, which is harder yet."

Smiling at each other, they settled into meditation.

The light supper he had eaten lay gently on Obi-Wan's stomach. Walking back along the corridors, his breath came a little faster than normal, but there was none of the sick queasiness of the morning. Perhaps it had just been a hangover, after all, for he knew his master was in their rooms, waiting.

Waiting, and probably ready to take him through the Ritual again.

Their long meditation had yielded no forebodings of doom, either from Obi-Wan's drifting on the tides of the future, or from Qui-Gon's intense immersion in the present. If anything, Obi-Wan would have said the Force came to him cleaner, stronger, sweeter than it had for some while.

Qui-Gon had left him soon after the noon hour, called to Council. Obi-Wan used the time to think more about the Ritual of Acquiescence. He had previously ranked it on a par with the more tedious of the physical exercises, such as spending four sleep-deprived nights in succession guarding a locked door with nothing behind it, or the Sloth Kata, boring and muscle-destroying at the same time.

Now he was forced to reconsider. Despite his experiences of the morning, he was surprised by Qui-Gon's remarks about Xanatos' resistance to the Ritual. At first he wondered whether Xanatos, showing greater insight even at so young an age, had merely acknowledged emotions Obi-Wan was hiding from himself.

But the longer he meditated, the more that notion seemed wrong. He was not Xanatos. He did not share that tragic young man's self-centred worldview. He had a deep understanding of his place in the Jedi order: it was there that he belonged, with every iota of his being, and he had no wish to rebel against it. Indeed, if he had any complaint against his master, it was Qui-Gon's constant urge to such rebellion. As for physical submission, isn't that what he did every day, straining muscle and sinew in katas, risking his life in the field? The idea of encoding that submission in one symbolic act seemed more than right: it seemed comforting.

He hadn't realised that before. He could actually enjoy this Ritual, participating in it rather than simply experiencing it. Instead of bringing nothing to it, he could bring his sincere love for the Jedi, and his love for his master. Ah, that felt better.

Appreciating that he had made great progress, he allowed himself to relax back out of the meditative trance, becoming aware of the delicate tones of sunset, the sky over the balcony a fragile eggshell blue tinged with gold. Massaging cramped limbs, he hobbled through into the salon, determined to put in an hour's work on Master Lao-Ma's exercise before supper. But, before he left for the research stacks, he composed a brief message for Qui-Gon:

Master Jinn,

If it pleases you, your padawan would like to assay the Ritual of Acquiescence with you this evening.

Obi-Wan Kenobi

And if Qui-Gon took his small hint from the formality of the note, perhaps tonight would be very different from this morning.

Now, on the way back to his rooms, Obi-Wan vowed that in one way it would be very different indeed. He would pay attention to any disquiet he experienced, giving his master ample warning. He would not betray Qui-Gon's confidence in him.

Walking into their tiny hallway, he was surprised to see only one light burning in the salon, the tiny table lamp by his own lounging chair. Beside it there was a message; unlike his earlier, data-coded note to his master, this was hand-written. Obi-Wan held the rough-pressed silk paper, shot through with golds and greens, in the pool of light, struggling to decipher Qui-Gon's bold but erratic hand.

Padawan Kenobi,

If it still pleases you to assay the Ritual of Acquiescence this evening, I have laid out suitable attire on your bed. I wait upon your coming.

Your Master

QGJ

And that, Obi-Wan thought with a shuddering breath, represented a gauntlet thrown down in challenge, as well as an awful pun. A tiny spark of desire began to grow in his belly. Suddenly he was aware that his master was very close, probably in the room just beyond, probably equally aware of his own presence. Qui-Gon had said that the element of sexual stimulation was not the core of this Ritual; Obi-Wan had virtually ignored that comment, since he had never approached it in a sexual light. Now, he was not so sure.

Despite his sudden surge of anticipation, Obi-Wan took his time dressing in the garment Qui-Gon had laid out for him. For one thing, it was very complex, with ribbons and archaic fastenings that challenged Obi-Wan's knot-tying skills. For another, he decided to bathe first, wallowing in a tub of water scented with hazzanut oil and crushed basil leaves. He was normally too impatient for the long baths his master enjoyed, but tonight it seemed apt to prepare himself carefully.

Guided by the same instinct, before he dressed he anointed himself with a thick cream, pushing it deep inside. It was cool to touch but would warm within his body. When Qui-Gon came to prepare him, there would be no shock of cold gel to make his body contract. To his satisfaction, he felt no more than the normal pressure around his probing fingers as he worked in the cream.

This was going to be fine.

Struggling to secure the final sash around his waist, he wondered how Qui-Gon intended to get this convoluted costume off him. But one step towards the mirror gave him the answer. The robe -- for it fell to the floor in stiff folds from the waist, more like a robe than a jacket -- had great slashes up the sides to his hips, held closed now by tiny ribbons. Just a glimpse of thigh showed as he walked toward his staring image, but if those ribbons were undone...

His heart was beating a little faster now. Under the robe, he was naked: the shifting of the heavy material against his bare skin made him far more aware of that than his leggings ever had. He stared at his reflection, taken aback by how little like his normal self he looked. Qui-Gon had chosen a rich blue for him which shone beneath the lights, bringing out the hint of red in his hair. He was shod in silk slippers rather than workaday boots, and of his own initiative he had twined a blue ribbon from the costume into his braid.

He was as ready as he could be. Time to end his master's long wait. Walking back across the darkened salon, he reached out to locate Qui-Gon. Oddly enough, he sensed the older man, not in his own bedroom where Obi-Wan had expected him, but in the formal dining room. That was in keeping with the general atmosphere, he supposed. He felt Qui-Gon respond to the questing touch, coming more vibrantly into focus. Obi-Wan guessed his master had spent the time waiting in meditation, though before he could reach the dining room doors Qui-Gon was fully alert, expecting his entrance. Taking a deep breath, Obi-Wan pushed open the doors.

It was quite a sight that met his eyes. The room was lit with candles, burning in candelabra ranged round the walls. The heavy wood table was shrouded in a deep red cloth; the chairs had vanished, but a smaller sidetable had taken their place. On it there was a silver tray bearing small glass jars. And, standing in the flickering light, Qui-Gon waited with hands held loosely by his side.

Just as his own reflection in the mirror had not matched the Obi-Wan he met there each day, so Qui-Gon also appeared a stranger to Obi-Wan's eyes. His master, too, had discarded boots for silk slippers, and wore a robe similar to Obi-Wan's but of a deep green, which brought out the silver in his beard. He had wreathed silver cords through his hair, which was swept severely back from his face and tied in one elaborate braid. He, too, looked exotic and alien, his features harsh without the softening frame of hair.

But there were two important differences between them that struck Obi-Wan immediately. Qui-Gon's hands sparkled slightly in the shifting light of the candles: he was wearing microgaunts, gloves no thicker than a molecule, used for delicate work where a sense of touch was essential but the wearer wanted to avoid actual contact. And his robe was not slit at the sides, but opened up the front.

Taking a deep breath, Obi-Wan stepped forward. "Good evening, my Master."

"Good evening, my Padawan." Qui-Gon surprised him then by bowing deeply, his long body sweeping a curve through the air as his hands came to clasp in front of him. When Qui-Gon had straightened again, Obi-Wan was quick to return the gesture, the tip of his braid brushing the parquet floor.

"I thank you for the kindness of your presence here." There was no emotion in Qui-Gon's voice, but Obi-Wan noticed that he had tucked his hands into the long sleeves of the robe, a gesture many Jedi adopted to hide telltale body signals.

"I thank you for your invitation."

Qui-Gon took a step forward, freeing one hand to indicate the silver tray. " If it would please you, this is a beverage for you to partake of."

Finally Obi-Wan recognised the words they were exchanging. It was another ritual: not a Jedi ritual at all, but the formal betrothal ceremony of the Shue people of Nappa Minor. He had studied it for a mission which had never taken place; Qui-Gon had commiserated the lost effort, but said that no knowledge was ever useless. Once again, his master had proved himself right in the most unlikely of circumstances.

Cudgelling his brain for the correct response, he hazarded, "If you would partake of it with me, my pleasure would be complete."

Judging by the sudden twitch of Qui-Gon's lips, Obi-Wan guessed he had just made a fatal breach of protocol, but after a moment his master triumphed over the urge to correct him. The big man picked up a flask of purple glass from the tray, pouring out thimblefuls of a thick, mauve liquid into two silver cups. With deliberate movements, he returned the flask to the position from which it had come, and lifted the small cups from the tray, his hands virtually eclipsing them from view.

Then he unexpectedly sank to his knees in one flowing gesture, still holding the cups carefully level. It meant he had to tilt his head to meet Obi-Wan's eyes, an unusual state of affairs for the pair of them. He extended one cup, hand held up for Obi-Wan to accept the offering, the other cup cradled against his chest. "I would join with you in this drinking as I would join with you in the flesh of your body."

Gods. How could Obi-Wan have forgotten. The betrothal ceremonies were always completed by physical intercourse between the engaged couple; a couple who, typically, had never met each other before that day. The one providing the dowry usually penetrated the other in the presence of both their families. At least Obi-Wan was being spared the witnesses.

With a helpless sense of inevitability, he conceded that there was no more formal way Qui-Gon could have asked him to complete the Ritual of Acquiescence. He knew his answer -- now, if he could only remember how to phrase it.

Qui-Gon was waiting; there was a slight tremor in the hand holding out the silver cup.

"Uh -- if the drink you offered me were as sweet as honey, yet it would not rival the sweetness of our joining." Carefully he took the vial from his master's hand. Qui-Gon's eyes closed in relief, shoulders relaxing; then he brought his own cup to his mouth with both hands and sipped the liquid, head bowed in front of his padawan.

Slowly Obi-Wan lifted the vial, stopping for a moment to inhale the perfumed odour. It smelt of crushed violets and aniseed, with a heavy, sweet undertone that mingled with the smoky scent of burning tallow filling the room. One small taste confirmed his suspicions: the mixture was cloying on his tongue, meant to be sipped slowly.

So he stood, taking in the sickly drink in small tastes, while his master knelt at his feet. Glancing at Qui-Gon between tastes, Obi-Wan felt the tense anticipation rise again in his stomach. There was something so erotic about standing here, formally dressed, drinking with ritual restraint, yet aware that in the next few minutes the huge man kneeling before him would tip him over the table and... he shuddered, but not in dread this time. He wanted to dispense with these formalities now; he wanted to feel Qui-Gon's fingers in him.

Abruptly he put the vial back down on the tray. Qui-Gon's eyes shot open in surprise, growing even wider when Obi-Wan unceremoniously took the second cup from his fingers and placed it on the tray, too. Obi-Wan nearly laughed at the surprise on his face.

But he didn't want to pull completely out of this strange semi-fantasy. "While the drink you offered me was as sweet as honey," he improvised, "still our joining will be sweeter."

He heard the click of Qui-Gon's tongue against his palate, a familiar reproof for his impatience. But it seemed his master was willing to follow his lead, for Qui-Gon reached out to take between finger and thumb the bottom ribbon securing the left slit up Obi-Wan's robe. "If it would please you, I would take this ribbon as a token of our joining."

"It would please me for you to have my token." The whispered response appeared to satisfy Qui-Gon. Delicately, he pulled at the length of ribbon, freeing it from the cloth and letting the robe swing slightly open. Then he reached over to the right, and took hold of the bottom-most ribbon there.

No, surely he wasn't planning on a question and answer for every ribbon. They would be here till tomorrow morning, at that rate. Qui-Gon looked up, his mouth about to open -- and Obi-Wan glared at him till he shut it again. Shaking his head in resignation at his padawan's reproachable behaviour, Qui-Gon tugged gently at the length of silken tie till it came free in his hand. He let it fall to the floor.

One by one, he pulled each ribbon loose, and for Obi-Wan it was an exquisite torture: the brush of warm fingers against his calf, the back of his knee, his thigh; the rustle of cloth shifting as more of his body was exposed. Qui-Gon did not deliberately part the panels of his robe, but Obi-Wan was achingly aware that he could have. That he could reach one of those large hands under the soft material and run his hand up over Obi-Wan's now prominent erection...

But that was not what Qui-Gon was here for.

The last ribbon discarded, Qui-Gon moved to his feet, the long robe making his movements seem flowing and free. Standing, he towered over Obi-Wan once more, no longer supplicant but leader. Those blue eyes took in Obi-Wan's flushed cheeks, then dropped lower. The bulge in Obi-Wan's robe must have satisfied him, for he made one step back and held out his hand.

"If it would please you, I would lay your body down for our joining."

"It would please me to give my body over to you, for you to lay it down." Obi-Wan rested his fingertips on Qui-Gon's and stepped forward, treading over the ribbons that lay like cornflower petals on the rich wood floor. He let the big man lead him to the table, hands outstretched, each step more like the steps of a dance, with Qui-Gon's eyes never leaving his face as they moved in measured pace across the room. Obi-Wan was acutely aware of that piercing look. The tension in his stomach was getting far worse, and with surprise he recognised that it was comprised only of lust, not fear. The fingers brushing against his would soon be stretching him for something larger. He planned to enjoy every moment of that touch.

There was a part of the ceremony here which he was supposed to do, but he couldn't remember what it was. Instead his attention was caught by the expanse of table in front of him, draped over with a heavy, quilted satin which would pad the hard surface for him. At the other end, beyond the cloth, candles in an ornate branching candlestick dripped white wax onto the gleaming wood. He took his hand from Qui-Gon's and turned to stand in front of the table, the edge of it hard against his risen cock. He leant over, stomach and chest on the cloth, arms stretched out in front of him. Slowly he let his weight be taken by the sturdy support beneath him, relaxing torso, hips and knees. He closed his eyes with a sigh.

"If it would please you, I am laid here for your eyes to partake of me." He was almost surprised that the hazy, dreamy voice was his. Those words must have come out of some deep well of memory.

"It would please my eyes to partake of you, for no sight could be sweeter." Qui-Gon's reply was slightly strained, but Obi-Wan didn't want to open his eyes enough to check his master's expression. He felt the man move round to stand behind him; then there was the sensation of the cloth against his heels being lifted free. Slowly Qui-Gon rolled up the whole back panel of the robe in one fat tube, successively baring calves, knees, thighs and then buttocks to the air.

Hands fumbled along his ribs, securing the roll of cloth against the small of his back with spare ribbons. Obi-Wan vaguely remembered that he had wondered what those were for, when he was trying to put this thing on. The weight of the bunched cloth against the base of his spine was oddly comforting. "If it would please you, I am laid here, for your hands to partake of me." Yes, those were the right words.

"It would please my hands to partake of you, for no feeling could be sweeter." This time he knew he hadn't imagined the hoarseness in Qui-Gon's voice, but that felt right, too. His master should be aroused by the sight of his muscled legs, the plump curves of his bottom. So what if Qui-Gon had seen these things many times, in changing rooms or close quarters on missions? So what if his master had been unmoved by them before? Here and now, it was right that Qui-Gon should lust to touch him, just as he had discovered a lust to be touched.

A delicate hand brushed the back of one knee. How could such big hands be so gentle, Obi-Wan thought in wonder. The fingers trailed up, just inside the curve of his thigh, and suddenly a spear of desire shafted through Obi-Wan, from his stomach down to his curling toes. He shifted his knees further apart, hearing Qui-Gon's breath catch. The new position meant his cock was being compressed against the table, welcome pressure as his torso bore more of his bodyweight. Now Qui-Gon had freedom of the space between his thighs, could stroke from balls to spine if he so chose.

Obi-Wan wanted to beg a further touch, but he knew better than to interrupt the Ritual. When Qui-Gon set his mind to doing a thing properly, that was how it was done. So he suffered in silence the brushstrokes against his inner thighs, the tickle of the fine hairs on his balls, the tentative pressure against his perineum. All delightful, all pure pleasure, and Obi-Wan could not understand how he had ever considered this Ritual just another exercise to be gotten done with. He wanted it to go on forever, just like this, but then again if Qui-Gon didn't do something more soon...

Oh. One probing finger slipped up into his crease, circling his anus. He pushed down with all the muscles in his abdomen, trying to open the tiny pucker himself to welcome that finger in. An even more tantalising brush against the tender flesh -- and then it had slipped past the tight ring, and Obi-Wan was contracting all his muscles to pull it deep within himself.

"Shh." He could hardly hear the soft whisper above his head. "I'll take it out--"

"More!" Force, was that his voice, so harsh and commanding? He gasped a deep breath to calm himself. "If it would please you," he managed, "I am laid here to be opened by your touch."

He heard Qui-Gon's own breath catch before he replied, "It would please me to open you further for my touch." The subtle difference between question and response had Obi-Wan shaking.

But that was as nothing to the shudders which started to rack him when Qui-Gon began to move his finger, a slow push against Obi-Wan's flesh and an equally slow pull back to the tight ring. Obi-Wan was torn by a need to spread his legs further yet, to get Qui-Gon as deep into his body as he could; and to pull them back together, to feel the friction more strongly. But he doubted his master would countenance any movement at all, so he lay quiet, aching for each sensation. Wanting more.

Finally Qui-Gon moved position, keeping his finger in place but shifting close enough that Obi-Wan could feel the pressure of his body, Qui-Gon's robe soft on his bare leg. One big hand came down onto the table near his head as Qui-Gon braced himself on the surface. Obi-Wan reached out for it, curling his fingers round the warm skin.

Qui-Gon stroked deep within him, brushing against his prostate, and in the spangle of pleasure that darted through him he lost the moment when a second finger joined the first. All he knew was that there was a delicious stretching adding to the sensations overwhelming him. Separating, easing, coaxing: they sought to soothe even as they stimulated.

Lust slowly easing into enjoyment again, Obi-Wan turned his face slightly towards Qui-Gon. He could just see the side of his master's averted face, bared as it was by his swept-back hair. Qui-Gon was utterly focussed, his brow furrowed as he worked his fingers into his padawan. Obi-Wan found it hard to reconcile the image. Here was his master, concentrating as he would on any problem Obi-Wan brought him. There, in his arsehole, were long fingers plying him open. How could the two be related? What part of this picture was he missing?

Obi-Wan lost the whole train of thought as Qui-Gon sent a third conqueror the way of the other two. This stretching hurt a little, Qui-Gon's knuckle thick in his narrow passage. Obi-Wan's fingers, which had lain loose on the hand beside him, closed instinctively. But Qui-Gon did not threaten to withdraw this time: instead, he stilled until Obi-Wan's fingers uncurled again. Then he began the slow push and pull once more.

There was a different intent behind the movements now. They were faster, slightly rougher against the tingling flesh just inside his anus, deliberately nudging his prostate at erratic intervals. Qui-Gon was edging closer to that narrow line between pleasure and pain, inciting Obi-Wan to a passion which could ignore the difference: a passion Obi-Wan welcomed eagerly.

He forgot to breathe. Incapable of words, he was desperately glad that he had Qui-Gon's hand beside him, letting him signal with squeezes and strokes and once with his nails how he wanted to be touched, how much more he could take. He was aching, he was wanting, his cock was weeping on the red satin beneath him: one hand was wringing the soft cloth in its grasp while the other clung to his master's. When Qui-Gon slowed, Obi-Wan wanted to scream denial. But he knew what the gently withdrawing fingers were asking of him.

He swallowed hard. Searching desperately through his shattered mind, he remembered how to make the words he needed. "If it would please you, I am laid here for your cock to partake of me. I am laid open for you to enter me."

Underneath his hand, Qui-Gon's formed a fist. Surely he wanted it as badly as Obi-Wan did, by now?

"It would please my cock to partake of you, for nothing in my life could be sweeter." The throaty response had Obi-Wan's stomach churning again. "It would please me to enter your body, opened only for me."

Traditional words, Obi-Wan belatedly remembered. Formality and tradition and ritual, but what did Qui-Gon himself really want? Obi-Wan had paid scant attention to that this evening.

While this thought flitted through his head, Qui-Gon was tugging at the ribbons securing his own robe down the front, freeing them with the hand that had just been inside Obi-Wan; the other was still firm in his padawan's grasp. He twisted his body round to stand between Obi-Wan's spread legs, bracing both arms on the table and enveloping Obi-Wan in a warm cocoon of silk and flesh. Against the back of his legs, Obi-Wan could feel the slippery cloth sliding, but against his buttocks, Qui-Gon's hot, sweat-dampened skin clung to his. And between them -- something oiled, something hot, something hard. Yes, Qui-Gon wanted this.

His left hand clutched at the fingers wrapped round his own; his right hand sought the same. Qui-Gon let Obi-Wan capture the fingers which had recently opened Obi-Wan's body: there was a musky smell to them, not strong but not the clean scent of Qui-Gon's own skin. Him. It was him, on his master's hand.

No. It wasn't on his master's hand. In the flickering light of the candles, he saw the glitter of the microgaunts. His scent was on the gloves his master wore as a barrier between Obi-Wan's flesh and his own. A formal barrier, one that allowed an illusion of intimacy without really granting it -- just as a Shue betrothal ceremony offered physical intimacy between strangers.

Which wasn't really intimacy at all.

And immediately upon the thought, the wrongness of what they were doing overwhelmed him, and his body began to tighten even as the tip of Qui-Gon's cock found his opening.

"Stop."

He had no idea how he managed the strength of will to say that. For a moment, he thought Qui-Gon would ignore him, would push into his rapidly contracting hole with a force of passion that would overwhelm his objection. Part of him was pleading with Qui-Gon to do just that, to just do it, and bring this whole charade to an end.

But then his master gave a deep groan and let his head fall forward between Obi-Wan's shoulderblades, thrusting his hips back and away. His nails were cutting into Obi-Wan's hands, even through the microgaunts. Obi-Wan stayed completely still, accepting the small, sharp crescents of pain, listening to Qui-Gon's ragged breathing. He screwed his own eyes shut, welcoming the darkness.

Finally Qui-Gon pulled away, turning his back to Obi-Wan as he tugged his robe around him. "Tidy yourself, Padawan," his voice was a rough growl.

"I'm so sor--"

"Quiet!" The sudden explosion shocked Obi-Wan. "Just tidy yourself. Please." The voice was gentler, but with such a note of strain that Obi-Wan hastily pushed himself upright, wrenching at the ribbons holding the back panel of his robe in place. Luckily they didn't snarl in his clumsy grasp; in an instant the panel had swung down to his ankles, and in another he had tied makeshift loops through the holes at the knees, securing them. Dully he noticed that his erection was starting to subside.

"I -- " What could he say? Qui-Gon must be furious with him. Obi-Wan had demanded more ceremony, and Qui-Gon had given it. Obi-Wan had dictated the pace, and Qui-Gon had followed it. Obi-Wan had asked for more, Obi-Wan had let them both get to the limits of their control -- and then he'd called a halt, for no obvious reason. There was no trace of the sick fear he'd felt that morning. There was no disturbance in the Force, no presentiment of danger. Just a knowledge that this was wrong.

He stared at Qui-Gon's stiff back. "I'll leave you alone. I am sorry, Master." He turned to go, but Qui-Gon's voice halted him.

"No, Obi-Wan. Don't leave just yet." He turned back to see that Qui-Gon was facing him now, every line on his face sharply delineated by the dancing shadows. His master took a deep breath. "You have nothing to be sorry for. It was just... a bit hard, that's all." Qui-Gon gave a wry smile. "Even Jedi Masters can find some things hard."

He stepped closer to Obi-Wan, peeling off the gloves and tossing them to the floor before taking Obi-Wan's chin in his hand. "Don't fret, Padawan, please. You always worry so much!"

Obi-Wan smiled reluctantly.

"That's better." Qui-Gon let him go. "Now, then. I am going to tidy up this room. You," he eyed Obi-Wan in a brisk, business-like fashion, "are going to bed. You are not to lie there searching your brain for what went wrong this evening. We'll tackle that together tomorrow. Just get undressed, purge your system of that wine, and sleep. Do you understand me, Padawan?"

"Yes, Master."

"Right. Off with you."

By the time Obi-Wan reached the door, Qui-Gon was already extinguishing the candles.

"Oh, and Obi-Wan?"

Obi-Wan paused, his hand on the doorknob.

"Thank you," Qui-Gon said.

Obi-Wan ducked his head in acknowledgement before sidling out of the room. He didn't have to ask what Qui-Gon was thanking him for. He'd managed to stop Qui-Gon raping him: they both knew it.

Stripping off the gown, he crawled exhaustedly into bed, his mind racing in convoluted circles despite his master's bidding. Why had Qui-Gon worn the gloves? Why had it bothered him so? And what else was nagging at him?

Just before he sank into a troubled sleep, one answer came. The wine. He remembered now. It had been the proper Shue vintage, pressed from purple-skinned moonberries and tinted with violet flowers. It was quite rare, quite expensive -- and it was a mild aphrodisiac.

Obi-Wan unwound his limbs from his meditation posture, stretching each one slowly. He still had time for a few katas to warm himself up before breakfast. Getting to his feet, he extended one leg, bringing it up in minute increments till it was held almost parallel to his body, toe pointed over his head. A painful exercise at this pace, it was the first position of the Sloth Kata. The full thing would take nearly twenty ko, but he could probably finish the primary stanza before Qui-Gon appeared.

In the event, he had completed the second when his master palmed open the door to the balcony. Qui-Gon could not have been awake for long, since he wore only his old, faded cotton robe over his leggings and nothing on his feet. He leant against the sill, arms folded, watching Obi-Wan unfurl the fingers of one outstretched hand. It was the only motion Obi-Wan made, as he stood poised on tiptoe with the rest of his body perfectly still for the full four minutes the movement took.

"Excellent."

He slumped into an ungraceful heap, groaning softly.

"Better finish off with a few Butterfly stretches, Padawan. You don't want every muscle in your body to seize up."

"Surely only the ones in my little finger, Master." But he hauled himself to his feet, working the knots out of arms and legs while his master continued watching, brow furrowing.

"Why the Sloth Kata? I remember having to bribe you into practising it with the promise of two desserts."

"I should have held out for three." Qui-Gon's mouth twitched. "I thought I'd give it another try. After all, I managed to pass over so many of the nuances of the Acquiescence Ritual. I wondered what I might have missed in this."

"And your conclusion?"

"I was right the first time. At least two desserts."

Now his master laughed aloud, the sound ringing out in the tiny glass-enclosed space. Obi-Wan was surprised to find a previously unidentified tension draining away from him. He hadn't realised how worried he had been at the thought of Qui-Gon's reaction to him this morning. The release from mental strain was even more enjoyable than the release from the physical stress of the kata. Until Qui-Gon said, "And what nuances of the Acquiescence Ritual have you discovered?"

Ah, now there was the tricky question. Obi-Wan sat down slowly, composing his limbs into his favourite position, ankles braced on his thighs. "I have some ideas about that," he said, tipping his head back against the balustrade to look up at Qui-Gon.

"So you should. You've been meditating on the subject for most of yesterday."

"Without the progress I would have liked, as last night's failure shows. I'm sorry: I treated you very badly, Master."

"You apologised at the time, Padawan. And you were hardly to blame." Qui-Gon unfolded his arms and lowered himself down to sit opposite Obi-Wan, his long legs pulled up in front of him, bare toes uncurling on the warmed stone. "I'd far rather you stopped me then, than that we repeated the morning's fiasco. So what have you suddenly realised?"

Obi-Wan said slowly, "When I've thought at all about the Ritual in the last few years, I've always considered it in relation to myself: my role in the Order, my submission to the authority of the Council, my acceptance of everything that being a Jedi means." He lifted his head to look at Qui-Gon. "I forgot you would be involved, too."

"Masters do normally have some input into their padawans' training exercises." Qui-Gon pointed out drily.

"But this isn't a normal training exercise."

His master sighed. "So it has turned out not to be."

"Perhaps that's because I don't need to learn the normal lesson from the Ritual. You said that for Xanatos, like most padawans, this was a question of submission?" Qui-Gon nodded curtly. "I can't convince myself that lesson is relevant to me. If submission were the only issue, I could have passed this exercise years ago. So I can only assume I'm meant to learn something else."

He took a deep breath. "And I begin to think that 'something' has to do with you. I don't know if it's supposed to be like this, but your attitude matters to me. Yesterday I thought my problems were caused by..." he tried to formulate a tactful phrase.

"By my off-hand approach to the Ritual," Qui-Gon finished bluntly. "You can take me to task, Padawan. I thoroughly deserve it." He reached over to squeeze Obi-Wan's knee, then leant back against the wall.

"Not only that," Obi-Wan admitted sheepishly. "I was jealous, too."

"Jealous? You mentioned that yesterday, but I didn't think... Padawan, I've never known you show a tendency to jealousy before." Instead of giving the critical lecture on controlling emotions that Obi-Wan had half-expected, Qui-Gon looked concerned. He leaned forward to grasp Obi-Wan's knee again, this time keeping his hand there while he asked, "Have I been blind to your feelings for a long time?"

"Oh, no, not at all, Master," Obi-Wan laid his own hand over Qui-Gon's. "I don't know why I should suddenly react like that. To be honest, I've always pitied Xanatos, rather than envied him. He had so much and he threw it away, for a life of spite and greed. And it's not as if you draw comparisons between us when you talk about him."

Obi-Wan paused. "But you've never approached a training exercise this perfunctorily either. After all the fuss with Xanatos, why did you think I would need any less?"

"Because you are so different," came the flat reply. "With Xani, there was always some question of what came first: his loyalty to the Jedi -- or to himself. But with you... even when we disagree, you stand by me. I only fear sometimes that your loyalty to me is greater than it should be, Padawan."

Qui-Gon drew his hand away from Obi-Wan's and turned to gaze up at the passing traffic wheeling above them. "I had hoped that, even if you found the Ritual distasteful, such dedication to the Jedi would carry you through it. Though it pains me to admit it, I let myself be deluded by my hopes."

He rubbed his chin, the short hairs of his beard rasping beneath his touch. "In the end, Xanatos forced himself to submit to me. I don't think I hurt him, but it wasn't pleasant for either of us. I don't cherish the memory; I suppose I didn't want to contemplate the idea of going through the same thing with you."

Silence lay between them for a few moments. Then Qui-Gon stirred, leaning back against the wall once more and closing his eyes. "I fear, Padawan, that I wilfully ignored the approach of this Ritual, just as you did. It seemed so much simpler to -- to gloss over it. But in doing so, I have neglected my own roles, in the Ritual and as your Master."

"Calling it neglect is a bit harsh," Obi-Wan protested. "But I didn't want you to be," he took a deep breath, "so casual about fucking me. I did think I was worth more than that."

He waited for a moment, but Qui-Gon said nothing; he just sat with his head back and eyes shut, the sun playing on his face. Someone who knew him less well might think him half-asleep, dozing much like a sloth himself in the warmth. Obi-Wan, though, could see the slight tension in those wide shoulders. He knew his every word was being attended to, so he chose each one carefully.

"I want to thank you for the care you took of me last night. When I asked you for a little more formality, I never thought you would go to so much trouble on my behalf."

"It was hardly a trouble, Obi-Wan." Qui-Gon's voice was gruff.

Obi-Wan had to smile. "Only my master could conjure Shue wedding gowns out of thin air and think nothing of it."

Qui-Gon shook his head dismissively. "I just hoped to make up for my earlier carelessness."

"I don't quite understand, though," Obi-Wan said. "Why the Shue ceremony? And, for that matter, why is there no -- well, ritual -- for the Ritual itself? Is that part of the test: that the things I'm supposed to do and say will somehow come automatically?"

His master smiled. "You see the concept of ritual too narrowly, Padawan. I agree, for many the very word 'ritual' calls to mind a prescribed order of words and actions. In echoing the actions of those who have gone before us, we make ourselves part of the community they represented. Yet this Ritual has no set of actions which must be performed, no script of long-dead words. Just one deed."

"And in the doing of that deed," Obi-Wan mused aloud, "the padawan becomes part of the community?"

"Exactly. But the method of that joining, the way it is accomplished, isn't set by rote. It must be as individual as the padawan himself; must be as unique as his relationship to the Order."

"And to his master."

"And to his master, as representative of the Order -- and as an individual who shares a history with him."

"Last night I wanted to pretend you weren't my Master." A bald admission, for an emotion which surprised even him. He couldn't remember a time when he hadn't wanted Qui-Gon as his master, hadn't thought of the man and the role at the same instant. "I wanted to pretend you were someone I hardly knew, not the master I've been living with for the last six years."

"I know, Obi-Wan." The words were gently said. "You are hardly the first padawan who finds it less difficult to accept the Ritual with a bit of make-believe thrown in." Qui-Gon shrugged. "It is an oddity of human nature that we find it easier to expose our deepest selves to strangers, with whom we have no bond and whom we may never meet again. With strangers, there are no consequences to such a revelation. Perhaps that is the very reason why the Ritual is usually between Master and Padawan: to make that exposure more complete and more painful. To give it true meaning."

"But in the Shue ceremony, we could both pretend to be strangers," Obi-Wan guessed. "Is that why you chose it?"

"Partly. It also has elements I find aesthetically pleasing."

Obi-Wan felt the morning sun warm on his back, remembered Qui-Gon's thighs hot against his the night before. Ruefully he admitted to himself that those were probably not the aesthetic elements his master had in mind.

"I hope you don't mean that dreadful wine. Otherwise my opinion of your taste has just dropped drastically, Master."

Qui-Gon pulled his robe around his knees, as if to ward off a chill. "No, I fear I share your opinion of the wine."

"So why did you feed it to me, then?" He asked the question lightly, but his heartbeat began to race.

Now Qui-Gon met Obi-Wan's gaze, eyes slitted against the light. He paused for a moment before saying deliberately, "In the Shue ceremony, two people who are complete strangers fuck. They don't fuck because either of them wants to do so. They fuck to symbolise achievement of a goal -- the union of their families -- and they use the wine to make it easier on both of them. Can you think of a closer parallel to our situation, Obi-Wan?"

The blunt honesty of this statement shook Obi-Wan. "But I'm not really a stranger to you! You don't have to drug me with some weird aphrodisiac to make sex between us palatable."

"No?" The line of Qui-Gon's mouth was tight. "Then what do I have to do, Padawan?" His gaze was piercing, almost accusing.

"I--" Obi-Wan faltered. "I did want to, you know." He had wanted to very badly, and his master's entry into his body would have been more than palatable, more than pleasurable. Until --

"Why did you wear the gloves?"

"The microgaunts?" Qui-Gon appeared disconcerted, as if he saw the question as a counterattack.

"Yes! Why did you wear them?"

Qui-Gon looked down at his hands, clasped in his lap. "I thought it might be easier for you," he said almost reluctantly. "If there was some sort of barrier between us. It seemed to help for Xani."

"Oh." Obi-Wan was taken aback by that; he'd been expecting something quite different. "So you wouldn't have minded touching me, then?"

"No, Obi-Wan! Of course not!" Qui-Gon was swift to pat Obi-Wan's hand, making contact flesh to flesh. "I'm so sorry if I led you to think that."

"Well, it seemed to explain why you wanted to get the whole thing over with so hastily." Qui-Gon winced. "After all, there's nothing to say a master should want to do the Ritual any more than a padawan does," Obi-Wan hastened to reassure him. "It's a duty for you, too, just as it is for me. I didn't expect you to look forward to it -- even if I was hoping you'd see it as a little more than just a training exercise."

"I was wrong to treat it that way," Qui-Gon said gravely.

"And I was wrong to try and force us into some silly, formal ritual," Obi-Wan said in requital. "But, Master, when you decided to agree with my suggestion, weren't you effectively letting me cheat? Letting me play at being a stranger to you, rather than facing the truth of what was happening between us?"

"We get by as we must, Padawan."

That flatly practical tone sparked an ember of anger in Obi-Wan for the first time that morning. "Wasn't it you lecturing me yesterday about the shortcomings of a mechanical approach to this exercise? Talking about theoretical mastery?"

"Don't exaggerate the importance of it in your development, young man," Qui-Gon said quellingly. "The Ritual may be more than a training exercise, but do not blow it out of proportion, just because we find ourselves having to deal with it more quickly than I would like. You sound almost as if you were facing your Trials. How many of your friends have taken it so seriously?"

Obi-Wan knew very well that none of them had.

"But it was that serious for Xanatos." He didn't need to phrase it as a question.

"Are you Xanatos?" The curt riposte was enough to silence him.

"There's something else I want you to think about," Qui-Gon added, carefully not looking at Obi-Wan's crestfallen expression. "I would like to make an application to the Council this morning, for an alternative master to take you through the Ritual."

"No!" Obi-Wan's refusal was immediate and instinctive. He knew his face showed all his shock that Qui-Gon should even suggest such a thing; but, looking at his master's set expression, it was instantly clear that Qui-Gon would not respond to raw emotion. He had to fight this sudden determination of his master's on grounds of reason. Taking a deep breath, he marshalled his thoughts.

"Surely the Council will not allow any other master to take over the Ritual. Have they ever done so?"

"On occasion. Especially if the master and padawan are of different species."

"Which we aren't."

"They may still consider it. I would present the request to Yoda. He should be more open to persuasion than some of the others." In other words, Qui-Gon was hoping to manipulate his own master to push through a highly unorthodox petition. Ever the diplomat.

"I wouldn't have thought your credit with the Council was high enough to let this pass unnoticed. Won't they take you to task, even if they allow the suit?"

"And well they should wish to do so," Qui-Gon replied grimly. "You may not need to perform the Ritual at a sublime level, Padawan, but you should certainly manage to at least perform it with your own master." He rubbed the bridge of his nose as if to relieve an ache there, before doggedly continuing. "The Council is sure to want to attach blame to one or the other of us -- or both together. But they also want me to go to Malabar within the week. A motion of censure takes time they don't have, besides distracting me from necessary preparations: they will leave it until I come back. I'll worry about the future when it arrives, and not before."

If the threat of a comprehensive dressing-down from the Council couldn't sway Qui-Gon, he wasn't likely to budge for his padawan's arguments.

"But, Master, I can't see how anyone else could achieve what you haven't!" Obi-Wan was aware of the hint of desperation creeping into his tone, but chose not to quell it. Let Qui-Gon see how upsetting Obi-Wan found the idea. "Can't we just sort this out between us?"

"Yes, if we had the time!" Obi-Wan jumped at the sudden outburst. "If we had the three days I was able to give Xani, or the three weeks or the three months, or however long you need, Obi-Wan! I would give it to you and more."

Qui-Gon shut up as suddenly as he had begun. Taken completely aback by this flurry of emotion from his unexcitable master, Obi-Wan waited in breathless silence till Qui-Gon spoke again. This time he wasn't fooled by the impassive tone with which his master stated, "I want to be the one who takes you through the Ritual, Padawan. I want to find out what is wrong between us and amend it. But we simply do not have the time."

"Surely we could make time, Master?" Obi-Wan whispered. "We could do all this when we get back from Malabar; why are we trying to force it now, if it won't come?"

"Foolish boy! Do you never think?" Qui-Gon made no effort to hide the anger in his tones. "Why do you suppose they would let you go to Malabar, hmm?"

"I don't under--"

"Then attempt to do so." Qui-Gon pushed himself up in one swift movement, towering over Obi-Wan. "Until you can complete the Ritual -- with me or with someone else -- you are still an intermediate. I will go to Malabar, and you will be left here, Padawan."

"No! You can't go without me!" Obi-Wan struggled to his feet, wincing as pins and needles reminded him of the Sloth kata he had just performed.

"I will have no choice in the matter, and nor will you." Qui-Gon turned abruptly away and strode through the open door into the salon, leaving Obi-Wan to hop after him.

"But you need me at your back! Surely the Council will--"

"The Council will not let you come." The statement was flatly made, Qui-Gon not even turning to look at him. "I'll be under deep cover on Malabar: there'll be little opportunity even to practice katas, much less do any proper study. If you came, you wouldn't be able to return to the Temple for more formal lessons, perhaps for as long as a year. The Council were reluctant enough to consider a brand new senior going. If you're still an intermediate, they won't countenance it."

"No!" Obi-Wan thumped his fist against the door jamb, drawing Qui-Gon's gaze to him. "I've proved myself, Master! I already have more combat experience than half the seniors." He took a breath to calm himself. "Anyway, that's all irrelevant. You can't possibly go without backup."

"They'll appoint another knight to go with me."

"Someone who's never worked with you before? Who has no idea of your fighting style?" Obi-Wan asked incredulously. "And what about me? Do I just miss a year's training while you're away?"

Qui-Gon briefly shut his eyes, leaning his back against the wall of the salon. "No, of course you won't. Your time is too valuable to waste like that, especially at this stage in your life. They will appoint you a new master to complete your apprenticeship. You'll no longer be my padawan."

Obi-Wan couldn't believe he'd heard the words right. "No longer be your padawan? How could I ever not be your padawan?"

"Look on the bright side, Obi-Wan. You may find yourself with some nice, respectable master instead. For all I'd like to think otherwise," and the tone was very dry, "I may not be the right person to take you through to knighthood." Qui-Gon's mouth twisted. "It seems to be only my apprentices who baulk so thoroughly at this Ritual."

He held up a hand to quiet Obi-Wan's instant protest. "Which would you prefer, Padawan? Someone to take my place in the Ritual? Or someone to take my place as your master?"

"You know the answer to that!"

"Do I?" Qui-Gon leant back against the wall again, rubbing his eyes. "Perhaps the Council has a point. This mission will call for the utmost trust between us. We will be isolated, amongst enemies. We will depend solely on each other for all company, protection and solace. It's a heavy enough burden to push onto someone as young as you. But if -- for whatever reason -- you cannot trust me to perform so simple a thing as this Ritual with you, perhaps there is a good reason for us to be separated."

"I won't accept that," Obi-Wan said, low and fierce. "I'm your padawan, Qui-Gon Jinn. And I won't let any foolish fretting of yours, no matter how well-intentioned, come between us."

"It is hardly foolish, Obi-Wan. In truth, I have no idea whether our failure to finish the Ritual has any significance. It might only mean we are sexually incompatible; it might mean nothing at all. But in all conscience I can't just ignore it."

"I'm not saying you should ignore it," Obi-Wan argued back. "But you're talking about the mission requiring 'utmost trust', after saying you would take a complete stranger with you. That sounds fairly contradictory to me."

"Of course I wasn't planning to take someone else along," Qui-Gon answered impatiently. "The Council may appoint whomever they please; that doesn't mean I intend to accept a partner."

"The Council may appoint whomever they please as my Master; that doesn't mean I intend to accept anyone but you. So you'd best get us out of this mess, Qui-Gon. Because there is not a chance that I'll let you off on a dangerous mission like this on your own -- you'd better understand that. If I have to crawl aboard your shuttle, I'm coming with you. And if I have to go through the Ritual with another master, I'll do it."

They stared each other down for all of a minute before Qui-Gon sighed and let his head fall back. "Alright. I'll take you with me, but only if the Council agree. I'll send two petitions: one to appoint another master for the Ritual, and the other for them to consider letting you come as an intermediate."

His brow furrowed at Obi-Wan's obvious relief. "Don't get your hopes too high, Padawan. They are unlikely to agree to either. Then, I suppose, it's possible there's something in the Dahometh archives which might help: I'd best spend the day looking through them, just in case. But I'll send the message to Yoda asking for dispensation right now."

"Good." Obi-Wan knew his voice was gruff, but he was trying very hard to suppress the welter of conflicting emotions his victory brought. He'd won Qui-Gon's backing for his inclusion on the mission by acceding the point; yet the very thought of another master undertaking this most intimate act with him still seemed wrong. His own part in this failure rankled; the fact that it would be known to all the Council members made it even worse.

But Qui-Gon, forever the man to accept a situation and move on, was already pushing himself upright. "We won't know before tomorrow if the Council agrees. I suggest, Padawan, that you spend the night with more -- amicable? -- company. Practice as much penetration as you can. I know you've done it many times before, but perhaps putting yourself in the mindset with a friend more your own age will help."

"Yes," Obi-Wan responded slowly. "That might be a good idea. I'll see if Garon is in Temple tonight."

His master was already heading to the study. "Spend today updating yourself on Malabar; start with Mace's files in the restricted section of the library." It was a dismissal, Obi-Wan noted. "Before you go off, though, draw up a supply list of the things we may need. Not too much, but make sure you add in blasters, laser-rifles, perhaps some heavier weaponry. Our cover would be as mercenaries, so we must be seen to be properly equipped for a fight."

He stopped in the doorway, looking back at Obi-Wan with an odd expression on his face. "Mace was briefing me on the cover identities. He wanted a way to make it seem natural for us to sleep in the same room and guard each other's backs, given the danger. He suggested we should pose as lovers: it would convince other parties we couldn't be easily separated. Ironic, don't you think?"

The study door shut quietly behind him.

"Are you asleep, Master?"

Even if the sliver of light illuminating the sill of Qui-Gon's door hadn't given Obi-Wan his answer, his own tingling awareness of Qui-Gon would have done so. He'd crept into their rooms many nights at later hours than this to find his master still awake, reading or meditating alone in his bedroom to pass the time until Obi-Wan was safely home. His door would be closed, the salon dark and silent, but Obi-Wan could always sense Qui-Gon's restless waiting. If he went quietly to his own room, it would not be long before he heard Qui-Gon move about, and then the true stillness of his master succumbing to sleep would lull him to his own rest.

It was rare for Qui-Gon to call out a greeting in acknowledgement of his presence; but sometimes Obi-Wan would come to his door, still too charged with the events of the evening to consider sleep, and tap on the heavy wood panel. The answer was always the same.

"Come in, Padawan."

Qui-Gon was sitting propped up against the bedhead, a datapad balanced on his knee. Its pale glow flickered over the planes of his bare torso; the light Obi-Wan had seen came from a sidelamp near the door, but otherwise the room was dark. The sheets were pulled up around Qui-Gon's waist, the coverlet tossed onto a nearby chair, and his hair was unbound, falling over his shoulders in an untidy tangle.

Obi-Wan shut the door behind him. "Isn't it late to be reading?"

"I'm reviewing the history of the Acquiescence Ritual. What little there is of it." Qui-Gon held the pad a bit further away and read out loud, "'The origins of this Ritual must remain wrapped in mystery, its current form hidden in an obscure language, its future within the Jedi order questionable.' Or at least that's what Horatius had to say two hundred Standard Revolutions ago." Qui-Gon snorted. "I think we can dispense with his learned opinion."

While Qui-Gon was quoting the offending passage, Obi-Wan had perched on the edge of the bed, unfastening his boots. He kicked them off and sprawled across the centre of the wide expanse which the furnishing department had deemed necessary to accommodate his large master.

"Surely it must say something more useful. Let me see." He reached out a languid hand.

Obediently Qui-Gon handed over the datapad. "I doubt there's anything there worth finding. By the look of it, Horatius didn't even take the trouble to learn any Dahometh. An obscure language, indeed! How can he pontificate about the Ritual when he hasn't read the two original source Folios it's based on?"

Obi-Wan ignored Qui-Gon's scornful dismissal of the great Jedi scholar, as he scrutinised the text. "Exactly what I thought!" he declared, flourishing the pad at his master.

Qui-Gon leaned over to peer at the screen. "What?"

"The text is the same size as normal."

"What? Padawan, that's completely irrelevant."

"Master, it's not. The text is the same size as normal, yet here you are holding the pad at arm's length and squinting. When did you last have the healers check your eyes?"

"Honestly, Obi-Wan! I thought you'd found something important." Annoyance and frustration were equally balanced in Qui-Gon's tone. "We have three days before the mission begins to find the key to this Ritual, and here you are blithering about my eyesight."

"My point exactly," Obi-Wan retorted. "In three days you are off for a full year to some Force-forsaken planet whose medical technology has been utterly destroyed, along with any other infrastructure the place ever possessed. You are getting your eyes checked. Tomorrow."

Qui-Gon retrieved the datapad, muttering.

"I'll make the appointment for you in the morning. I'm sure poor Master Ibbith will be able to squeeze you into his schedule; he's always happy for any excuse to get his hands on you." Obi-Wan crossed his hands over his chest and closed his eyes.

"Who would ever want to have an apprentice?" Qui-Gon said bitterly. "You feed them and teach them and love them, and this is how they repay you, throwing you to the healers." He snapped the datapad shut and laid it aside on the bed.

"Well, at this rate I doubt you'll have an apprentice for much longer. Unless the Council accept impotence as an excuse for not completing the Ritual, that is."

Qui-Gon's voice was stiff with indignation. "Padawan, my eyes might not be as good as once they were, but I'm not so old that I can't--"

"I don't mean you, Master! I mean me."

"What?"

Obi-Wan gave a long drawn-out sigh and opened his eyes again to stare at the ceiling. "Not only am I incapable of letting myself be fucked, it would also appear that I'm equally incapable of fucking anyone else."

"Oh," Qui-Gon assimilated the information. "So the evening was not a success."

"No," Obi-Wan replied flatly. "Isn't that what you were waiting up to hear?"

"I was not waiting up." Qui-Gon gave the rote answer, his mind clearly occupied elsewhere.

"You always wait up."

"Nonsense. I'm usually asleep when you finally come in."

"No, you are very rarely asleep. And even when you are, you're tossing and turning and sending out little Force tendrils to make the hallway a maze of tripwires. Why do you think your sheets are so crumpled in the morning?"

Qui-Gon ignored his padawan's irrefutable argument. "I take it that you reacted to Garon in the same way you've been reacting to me."

"Garon; and Hestia and Dee-Dee, in fact. But it wasn't quite the same as the way I've been reacting to you."

"Oh?"

"I couldn't even manage to let them put their fingers in me."

"With Hestia's nails, I would have counted that as a blessing," Qui-Gon said lightly.

Obi-Wan pushed himself up on one elbow to glare at his master. "It's all well and good for you to make fun, Qui-Gon, but I didn't find it so amusing. In fact, I'd just about rate it as the most embarrassing, humiliating and disappointing evening of my life so far, if it wasn't for a dozen others I've had the joy of experiencing as your padawan." Slumping back down on the bed, he sniffed, "I came in here for some sympathy, not to be laughed at by you as well."

"I'm sorry, Padawan." Qui-Gon smoothed over Obi-Wan's ruffled hair with one large hand. "I'm sure your friends didn't mean to hurt your feelings. And it might be selfish of me, but I can't help being a little relieved." At Obi-Wan's puzzled look, he continued softly, "I didn't enjoy thinking that you couldn't bear my touch, when you take such pleasure in sharing your body with others."

Obi-Wan suddenly wanted to see Qui-Gon's expression very badly, but before he could lever himself up again his master had turned away to place the notepad on a shelf by the bed.

"Well, now," Qui-Gon's voice was crisply efficient when he turned back to his padawan, "let's see what we have to work with. Exactly what happened, Obi-Wan?"

Obi-Wan groaned and lay back on the coverlet, the smell of crisply starched cotton faint in his nostrils. "First of all Hestia tried to fuck me, but he hadn't got very far when--"

"That much detail is unnecessary," Qui-Gon cut in. "What I actually want to know is whether you felt the same level of anxiety you did two mornings ago."

"None at all. I wasn't expecting any problems; in fact, I was looking forward to it. The last few days have been rather frustrating." Qui-Gon forebore to comment. "But I just couldn't. My body wouldn't open up, although I was desperate for a good--" He suddenly remembered that this might not be the most tactful thing to say in the situation, and broke the sentence with a small cough.

"It wasn't that I felt anything wrong in the Force, either," he continued, hoping he'd hidden his gaffe sufficiently. At least from his supine position he didn't have to meet his master's eyes. "We were all in a good mood, not taking it too seriously. Then we thought that if I came I might be more relaxed, so Dee-Dee started going down on me. But the minute she touched me, I just -- wilted."

"Had you been drinking?" Qui-Gon's voice came from the head of the bed. "Taken any drugs? "

"No, I don't usually when I'm going to have sex."

"Masturbated previously?"

"No."

"And you weren't at all tense or nervous?"

"No! Seriously, Master, this has never happened to me before. To lose it in the middle like that... What's wrong with me?" Surely Qui-Gon would be able to help.

"I doubt there's any physical cause." Qui-Gon shifted his weight, tugging up on the sheet caught beneath Obi-Wan's shoulders. "It seems likely that this stems from whatever is also underlying our difficulties with the Ritual."

"You don't suppose the Force is implying I shouldn't ever have sex again, do you?" Obi-Wan was reluctant to voice the unpalatable idea, but the dire possibility had been spinning through his mind.

"It seems highly unlikely." Qui-Gon sounded amused at the suggestion. "For one thing, the Will of the Force is rarely so obscured. If it were to demand such a sacrifice of you, you would know deep within you it was the right course. Do you want to give up sex?"

Obi-Wan snorted. "Right at this moment, I need it so badly I'd jump a bantha if I was able."

"Then we can lay aside any assumptions that you are psychologically reluctant. I assume you're still masturbating without any problems? Did you try after your -- ah, disappointment?"

Obi-Wan cringed at the memory. "Yes, we tried that next. First me with the rest of them giving me an 'encouraging example', as they called it -- though I'd say it was getting a head start. When that didn't work either, they left me in peace to get on with it."

"But you couldn't?" Qui-Gon sounded genuinely surprised.

"Master, I have managed to get an erection when I haven't had any sleep for seventy-two hours. I've had erections whilst recovering from stab wounds, after I lost ten kilos from dysentery on Golla, and when I got that mysterious disease previously only known amongst Bothan sheep. Since I first discovered what it was for, my penis has been a loyal and faithful friend. But tonight, I couldn't."

"Ah."

Qui-Gon's lack of apparent sympathy galled Obi-Wan into seeking vengeance. "Is this what old age is like, Master?" He tilted his head back to see if the shaft had hit home, but Qui-Gon was deep in thought, his brow furrowed.

"Hush while I consider this, Padawan."

Obediently, Obi-Wan closed his mouth. Qui-Gon looked odd from this upside-down angle, the prominence of his nose and jaw emphasised by the shadows cast across the room. He so rarely wore his hair loose that the tumbled, silvering strands falling across his face made him seem unfamiliar, though Obi-Wan had seen those weathered features nearly every day for the last six years. A thought skittered across Obi-Wan's mind, a memory from last night, but it was gone in the moment he reached for it.

Sighing in frustration, he eased his head forward from the uncomfortable position and closed his eyes, his body flung haphazardly across the bed, waiting for Qui-Gon to come to a conclusion. He might even have been dozing a little when he heard Qui-Gon's deep voice mutter, "Perhaps..."

Then his master moved, and in that instant a large hand grasped between his thighs.

"Gods!" Obi-Wan almost screeched, jerking under Qui-Gon's hand. "Give a man some warning next time you grab his balls!"

"I'm hardly grabbing, Padawan," Qui-Gon said mildly. "Does this feel uncomfortable?"

"No..." Now that Obi-Wan had time to calm his racing heartbeat, he realised that Qui-Gon's hand was cupped round his testicles in a gentle hold, curling fingers encompassing his dormant penis. The big man had shifted down the bed to reach him; the sheets were bunched up against his waist as he stretched out over his padawan, broad palm a pleasant warmth even through the cloth of Obi-Wan's leggings.

"What were you hoping to--" Obi-Wan drew in his breath as Qui-Gon's long fingers rolled his penis within his leggings, the cloth a sweet friction against the softened flesh. "Oh," he gasped back out when Qui-Gon repeated the action, fingertips brushing along the nestled curve.

"Is that alright?" Qui-Gon didn't stop for the answer, continuing the delicate touches.

"Not so gentle," Obi-Wan requested, pushing himself up on his elbows and spreading his legs a little wider to accommodate Qui-Gon's hand. He watched with rapt concentration the slow movement of Qui-Gon's fingers over the mound at his groin. His breathing was fast and shallow, as much from tension as from the tiny jolts of pleasure those fingers were sending to his spine. Under his anxious gaze, the petted flesh took on definition, pushing up against the cloth separating hand from cock.

"Thank the Force!" Obi-Wan collapsed in relief. He was achingly hard, and life was wonderful.

Qui-Gon withdrew his hand. "I fancy the Force had little to do with it." He rubbed his eyes, looking tired suddenly. "We have begun the Ritual and invoked whatever power it embodies, but so far we have failed to face the demands it makes of us in turn. And our time runs short."

It was a sobering reminder, but another aspect of Qui-Gon's comment had drawn Obi-Wan's attention. "Master, you said earlier that it was our problem. Surely I'm the one to blame here? Aren't I the one who has failed?"

"No, my Padawan." Qui-Gon looked down at him, his face serious. "As your master, I too have a duty within the Ritual. I too can fail. For if one fails, the other has allowed the failure. We are together in this."

Obi-Wan turned on the bed, pressing his forehead to Qui-Gon's knee as it lay outlined by the coverlet. "I don't want to taint you with this, Master," he whispered. "Suppose they do separate us? Will they hold it against you? Will they stop you taking another padawan?" Hard questions, but he had to know the answers.

Qui-Gon's hand came to stroke his hair. "It hardly matters, Obi-Wan. I would have no stomach for another padawan in any case."

They stayed in silent thought for a few moments more before Qui-Gon stirred. "But we are not in such dire straits yet. There is something more I want to try tonight. Padawan, will you grant me your indulgence?"

The formal phrase made Obi-Wan pause. Its use implied that the favour Qui-Gon was about to ask of him could be freely refused by Obi-Wan, as one person to another, rather than as padawan to master. There was a formal rejoinder, inviting his master to ask the question without committing himself to an answer. He chose to ignore it.

"Whatever you want, Master. Just tell me."

"Umm. Well," Qui-Gon seemed taken aback by Obi-Wan's easy acceptance. "We've established that you can't maintain an erection through masturbation on your own. Would you try masturbating with me beside you?"

He lifted his hand in quick protest as Obi-Wan opened his mouth to speak. "I assure you, Padawan, this is not prurience on my part. But it would appear that the Dahometh Ritual resists being completed by us in our current state, yet also resists you taking sexual pleasure elsewhere. I want to test what difference my presence makes. Will it embarrass you too much to touch yourself in front of me?"

Obi-Wan was puzzled by Qui-Gon's concern over this request. "Why should I be any more embarrassed by that than by anything else in the Ritual?"

"But this is not part of the Ritual. I have no right to ask it of you." Qui-Gon's face was visibly flushed, even in the low light of the room.

Obi-Wan was at a loss to understand his master's reluctance. They rarely made reference to it, but on the many long journeys through space where they were required to share a cabin, they had had little choice but to intrude on each other's privacy. He was used to the soft sounds in the dark that meant Qui-Gon was pleasuring himself in the neighbouring bunk. He always pretended sleep; but he knew his master wasn't fooled. Likewise, he was often grateful for Qui-Gon's diplomatic snore to cover his own harsh gasp of completion.

Yet Qui-Gon was clearly uncomfortable with the request he had made: a ludicrous sentiment in view of the far more intimate things they'd done -- or failed to do -- over the last few days.

Obi-Wan caught his master's fingers in a firm grasp. "You have a right to ask anything of me, Qui-Gon. I'm your padawan." He said the words slowly and distinctly. "You're asking this for us: I understand that. But even if you were asking it for yourself alone, I would still do it. Besides," and he flashed a wicked grin, "I think I could manage to enjoy it."

Qui-Gon gave a wry smile in return. "I do believe you could, my Padawan."

"Now that that's settled..." Obi-Wan rolled back over, closing his eyes as he slipped one hand down into his leggings. A sigh of satisfaction came as his cock twitched into the familiar embrace, achingly ready. He began to stroke himself, each touch sure and brisk, rougher than he would have liked from another's hand but just right for his body's current urging.

For all his bold words and the undoubted pleasure his hand was giving him, he was uncomfortably aware of Qui-Gon's presence on the bed beside him. He'd never imagined his master watching him masturbate; had rarely thought of Qui-Gon in a sexual context at all. Suddenly he wished his hair was as long as his master's, so it could hide his face while he did this.

But a quick peep from beneath his lashes showed that Qui-Gon had averted his head, giving Obi-Wan a modicum of privacy. It was enough: Obi-Wan closed his eyes again and gave himself over to the demands of his body.

A few minutes later, he began to voice a stream of quiet, deliberate profanities.

"Padawan?" Qui-Gon queried gently.

Obi-Wan took the time to finish a particularly convoluted Xerxjian curse before breathing in deeply. "This is getting silly."

He opened his eyes to the sight of Qui-Gon's worried face above him. "Since that failed to bring me any satisfaction, Master, I can only hope it brought you some enlightenment."

"Sadly not, Obi-Wan. Couldn't you..." he made a vague gesture with his hand.

"No, I couldn't. It went away, alright?" Obi-Wan knew he was being unfairly aggressive: this was no more Qui-Gon's fault than his own. The frownlines deepened across Qui-Gon's brow, and immediately Obi-Wan's irritation gave way to a lick of remorse. "Don't worry," he chided with an unconvincing smile, reaching up to touch the corner of Qui-Gon's mouth. Surreptitiously he disengaged the other hand from his leggings. "I will survive, you know."

But it was hard to quell the ache which had been gnawing at him, unassuageable, all evening. He couldn't understand why he wanted sex so badly: though he had all the appetites of a young, healthy male, he also had a Jedi's control and a warrior's discipline, and had often had to exercise them in the face of great temptation. Yet, lying here, he wanted -- despite his body's even more mysterious failure to cooperate. The only relief had been the blessed moments when Qui-Gon was caressing him.

Qui-Gon's voice was grave as he replied, "I'm sure you will survive, Padawan. Few have died of unfulfilled lust, after all. But this worries me more and more, that we neither of us understand what the Force is guiding us towards. I have rarely felt so unsure..." Lost in thought, his fingers curled around Obi-Wan's reflexively. "Perhaps there's a clue somewhere in the sources Horatius cites. I need to go through them in more detail--"

His master let go of his hand to reach for the datapad, but Obi-Wan caught Qui-Gon's wrist before he could pick it up. His heart was pounding madly in his chest: he couldn't believe he was about to ask Qui-Gon this question.

"Will you grant me your indulgence, Master?"

Qui-Gon stilled at the formal request, his eyes searching Obi-Wan's face. His answer, when it came, followed the prescribed form. "If it be in my power, and if it suit my pleasure."

Obi-Wan winced inside. He didn't want the hedgings and equivocations of the rote reply; he wanted the same unreserved trust he had offered Qui-Gon a few moments ago. Now he was more nervous than ever. This was his Master, the person who had been his guardian for six years. What a thing to request! But he had to ask.

"Will you give me relief, since I cannot find it for myself?"

He could tell immediately from Qui-Gon's shocked expression that his master would refuse him. Those blue eyes rarely showed emotion, but they were wide open now, pupils expanding rapidly.

"I can survive it," he whispered, "but it's beginning to hurt. Please, Master."

Qui-Gon was already turning away, pulling his wrist from Obi-Wan's grasp as he pushed himself off the bed. The creamy length of his thighs and buttocks flashed into view as he bent to snatch up a pair of discarded leggings. Obi-Wan caught his breath at the sight, then quickly shut his eyes, hearing the rustle of cloth as Qui-Gon drew the leggings on. He'd seen Qui-Gon naked many times and thought nothing of it; it was a sign of his desperation that a glimpse of his master's backside was enough to twist the frustration in him to a truly painful level.

Yet his penis was still flaccid, dangling uselessly between his legs. The ache was physical, sexual; but even if he could have achieved an erection on his own, he doubted that a climax could quench this hunger. And in the meantime, he'd selfishly pestered his master with a request that had obviously upset him. Qui-Gon had asked for something for them both; Obi-Wan's demand had been only for himself. He should apologise and leave now...

"Take off your leggings, Padawan." Qui-Gon's voice was quiet and steady as he settled back down onto the bed.

"What?" For a moment, Obi-Wan couldn't accept the meaning of Qui-Gon's simple words.

"Your leggings. Slip them down for me."

"Master," he didn't bother to disguise his relief as he stared up into Qui-Gon's earnest face. "You don't have to do this -- I shouldn't have asked--"

One large finger was pressed to his lips. "While I regret the necessity that forces you to ask it, Padawan, I am happy to do this for you. It is in my power, and it suits my pleasure." Qui-Gon accompanied the formulaic acceptance of his padawan's request with a small grin that on anyone else would have seemed sheepish. "It won't be such a hardship, Obi-Wan." The grin grew wider. "I might even manage to enjoy it. Now, if you haven't changed your mind..." He glanced pointedly at Obi-Wan's groin.

"Oh, no chance of that!" Obi-Wan's breath might have been stolen for a moment by that unexpectedly devilish smile, but he knew when action was called for. He hooked his thumbs into the belt of his leggings and obligingly wriggled till they were pushed down to his knees. "It's all yours," he spread his hands, indicating the limp cock snuggled up in its bed of curling hair. "A challenge for you."

"Hmm. I think this situation calls for drastic measures." Qui-Gon followed his lead, letting humour mask any discomfort he might be feeling. "Consider yourself warned that I'm about to grab your balls, Padawan."

Obi-Wan's laughter was abruptly transformed into a deep groan as Qui-Gon's fingers curled around his penis, gently pulling down the foreskin to expose the soft, pink head. Just that simple gesture was enough to have the blood pounding through his arteries, bringing him semi-erect again at painful speed.

"I don't think it's my balls you've got there, Master," he gasped. "But don't let that stop you."

Qui-Gon shook his head sadly. "I thought you had a challenge ready for me. How can I prove my abilities if you insist on responding so quickly?" His fingers followed his words, lightly teasing Obi-Wan's already hardened flesh.

Obi-Wan wanted to reply in kind, downplaying the urgency of his need with a joke, but at that moment Qui-Gon stroked a calloused thumb across the fraenulum just below the head of his cock. He gave a startled cry, the air pushed from his lungs by the shock of desire shooting up through him.

"Padawan?" The soft question requested Obi-Wan's reassurance, but he did not have it to give. He could only dig his fingers into the bedclothes, trying desperately to catch his breath. He had just been expecting a relief of tension; this intensity was startlingly more than he had bargained for.

"Obi-Wan," Qui-Gon spoke more firmly. "Look at me."

He didn't want Qui-Gon to see this lack of control in him, but in obedience he raised his eyes to meet Qui-Gon's intent gaze.

"It's alright, Padawan." The strength of conviction in the older man's tone was nearly enough to settle Obi-Wan's sudden discomposure. "Don't fear your own desire: I'm not here to judge you for it." Qui-Gon's voice gentled. "You can let me see. I'll not bring any shame nor harm to you. And I won't do this if it leads to shame between us."

Obi-Wan's mouth twisted. "Then I'd best not be ashamed, because if you don't do it, I'll go insane. Now, my Master."

The last was a command. Qui-Gon complied, his eyes never leaving Obi-Wan's as his thumb repeated that caress, rough skin sliding against smooth, sparking another shiver of sensation up Obi-Wan's spine. This time he let the surge of desire rip through him, resolutely meeting his master's sympathetic gaze as his hips jerked up, pushing his cock against Qui-Gon's hand. He didn't try to stifle the whimper which left his throat. "Again."

Qui-Gon's hand closed around his shaft, nowhere near as firm as his grip would have been on his lightsabre, but tight enough to leave Obi-Wan shuddering as it moved inexorably up to enfold the weeping head. He knew his face was flushing red: he could feel the heat of it. But Qui-Gon's hand was hotter yet, soft skin and calluses stroking back down him.

They stared at each other as Qui-Gon did it again and again, each time a little harder. Each time, Obi-Wan moaned a little louder, and Qui-Gon's breathing grew a little faster, till their mouths were both open and their lips were swollen with the blood rushing to their cheeks. These obvious signs of arousal, so unexpectedly found on his master's flushed face, made Obi-Wan's desire sharper still; suddenly, he was proud that his own face must mirror Qui-Gon's, displaying his desire as much as did his rising hips -- for each time Qui-Gon stroked him, Obi-Wan pushed up to meet the descending hand.

But he was too eager, breaking out of Qui-Gon's rhythm more often than not, till he groaned between gritted teeth, "Gods, won't you go any faster? Please."

"I can't, Padawan." Qui-Gon's voice shook. "I'll hurt you. Let me get some oil--"

"Don't you dare stop!"

Qui-Gon did, though, for an excrutiating moment of indecision. The look on his padawan's face, part threat and part desperation, must have convinced him: he reared up and with both hands hauled Obi-Wan's leggings the rest of the way down, the sound of ripping cloth deeply satisfying in some atavistic way Obi-Wan didn't care to analyse.

Then any thought of analysis -- any thought of any kind -- fled completely as Qui-Gon pushed Obi-Wan's knees apart and swallowed Obi-Wan's cock into his mouth.

Gods, it was hot and it was moist, and Qui-Gon had taken him in halfway down his entire length, closing his lips round the rigid flesh and sucking hard. Qui-Gon's tongue had curled around to press against the sensitive folds just below the head of the penis where his thumb had earlier wrought such devastation on Obi-Wan's senses, the slight roughness of tastebuds just near the tonguetip enough to have Obi-Wan crying out loud, "Master!" Mindlessly, he thrust up into that liquid heat, uncaring of any harm he might do Qui-Gon.

His response must have been anticipated, for his master's large hands had already moved to shackle Obi-Wan's thighs to the bed, holding him down as he strove to ram himself into Qui-Gon's throat. The weight of Qui-Gon's heavily muscled torso absorbed the powerful upward surge of his body with ease, pinning him relentlessly in place. It was an unexpected blessing, for it left him free to push as hard as he wanted, his muscles craving their part in his fight for release. Qui-Gon leant into his fruitless thrusts, hands bruising on his thighs, mouth now sucking hard enough to bruise his cock.

"Oooh," Obi-Wan sighed, feeling the brush of Qui-Gon's hair against his inner thighs. "Please, it tickles...too much. C-can't take this. Let me come, Qui-Gon, I beg you."

He couldn't tell if Qui-Gon was paying him the least bit of mind, for his master's face was now hidden by the curtain of his silvered hair tumbling down to Obi-Wan's groin. The suction grew slacker, if anything, Qui-Gon's tongue no longer flat against the length of his penis, rubbing against the big vein there instead.

But his master was not without mercy, for a moment later Qui-Gon was lowering himself even further, slowly allowing the head of Obi-Wan's penis into the cavern of soft tissues at the back of his mouth. The delicate fluttering of Qui-Gon's epiglottis against the sensitive tip had Obi-Wan pleading mindlessly; then babbling his thanks as Qui-Gon pushed that little bit further to take Obi-Wan into the tighter channel of his throat. His lips were a soft warmth sliding all the way down Obi-Wan's shaft till they reached the root of his penis, his beard a prickle on Obi-Wan's balls.

"Please..." It was wicked to beg for more, when he had never imagined that Qui-Gon would do such an intimate thing for him, but he needed, so badly. His hands gripped the bedclothes in an effort not to wind into Qui-Gon's hair, because then he would push and push -- and if he came in his master's mouth, he would never live down the embarrassment. But it was going to be so hard to leave this incredible warmth...

Qui-Gon's tongue snaked out to lick round the root of Obi-Wan's penis, probing between its tender underside and his own lower lip. A moment later, the dampened curve of his master's lip slipped down, sliding moistly over the skin of Obi-Wan's scrotum, jaw opening wide to take in as much of Obi-Wan's genitalia as he could. Obi-Wan gasped at the gentle sucking pulling his balls up into that torrid heat. The movement forced Obi-Wan even further down Qui-Gon's throat, but his master didn't hesitate, relaxing his muscles to aid Obi-Wan's entry.

Then he swallowed around the invading cockhead. Obi-Wan shouted as the muscles rippled down the length of him to the tender tip of his cock.

His balls were released and Qui-Gon withdrew to halfway up his shaft, throat and lips and tongue caressing him with wet friction as they passed by. "No," Obi-Wan groaned, "don't leave me. If you love me at all -- ah!"

Qui-Gon had plunged back down to his root, quicker this time, throat muscles accepting Obi-Wan's passage with ease. Again the loose skin of his testicles were sucked up into the warmth, again his penis felt the grasp of muscles as Qui-Gon swallowed, and this time when Qui-Gon withdrew, Obi-Wan sobbed a protest to the sound of the sheet ripping beneath his hand.

Back down, and he couldn't stop himself, surely he didn't need to warn his master because the man must be able to feel the tightening of the balls beneath his lip, but Qui-Gon only pulled a little way back, enough to let Obi-Wan's seed fill his mouth as his padawan suddenly came, spurting into him. Obi-Wan jerked twice against the hold of Qui-Gon's hands on his thighs, yelling Qui-Gon's name in one long ululation of relief.

"Master," he had the breath left to whisper, when his softening penis finally slipped through Qui-Gon's lips. His master's hands grew gentle on his thighs, and Qui-Gon's head lifted so their eyes met again.

Qui-Gon's lips were a brilliant, bruised red, and he was still swallowing. Obi-Wan shuddered for the decadence of it, where he had never expected to see decadence before, but more for the stunned look on Qui-Gon's face.

Wordlessly, Obi-Wan patted the space beside him, and Qui-Gon moved to join him there, lying on the bed facing him. For a moment, they just looked at each other, no more than a finger's breadth between them. Qui-Gon's voice was hoarse when finally he spoke.

"You were very -- vocal."

"I'm sorry," Obi-Wan whispered, too ensnared by the brilliant blue of Qui-Gon's eyes to entertain any such regret.

"No, don't be. The last time I had a padawan on this bed..."

Qui-Gon's voice petered out as he continued to look into Obi-Wan's eyes, his face so close that his breath brushed Obi-Wan's mouth with each exhalation. They lay there, neither of them blinking, just staring at each other till Obi-Wan broke the spell.

"The last time..?" He watched as Qui-Gon's eyes shifted their gaze down to his mouth, as if he were lipreading to make sense of Obi-Wan's words.

"Xani. He wasn't so -- taken with it. It was good to hear you." Now that voice was like the sound of stones rolling along a river bed, slow and deep and gravelly.

"Thank you." He too spoke slowly, struggling to find words which slipped from his mind, blown away by the puff of Qui-Gon's breath on his lips. "Did you like doing that?"

Qui-Gon closed his eyes for a moment, a furrow of concentration marking his brows before he answered. "It was sweet within the Force. You taste good..."

"I do?"

"Not the way I thought you would. More -- of you. More like you."

Obi-Wan blinked sagely, as if he understood Qui-Gon's words. "Would you do it again for me? Now?" The question had left his lips before any thought of saying it occurred to him.

"Obi-Wan -- " His name was a strangled thread of sound. He watched Qui-Gon swallow, watched his pupils dilate once more till the intense blue of his eyes was nearly eclipsed by the inky depths.

It couldn't have been more than two ko ago that he had first asked Qui-Gon this question, hedged round with ritual and equivocation and fear. Now all he felt was a calm content. He wanted this. Qui-Gon would want it too. Everything was so simple.

As if the same thought had occurred to Qui-Gon, he began to smile, little lines creasing at the sides of his mouth till they were deep grooves. The dazed look had left his face: now his whole focus was intent on Obi-Wan.

"Would this be in the nature of a second dessert, my Padawan?" No longer the hoarse rasp of a moment ago, Qui-Gon's voice was laced with amusement.

Obi-Wan smiled back, slowly regaining his own focus. "It might be. I think I deserve some indulgence, anyway."

"Oh, do you?" Qui-Gon's teeth flashed white. "It seems to me as if I will be the one getting dessert. Or at least a taste of something new."

But Qui-Gon had already licked Obi-Wan most intimately; what did he--? Oh. Oh, his master couldn't mean... "Roll over, Padawan. And take off that tunic."

Oh, yes he did. Belatedly, Obi-Wan remembered that Qui-Gon never did anything by half measures. Already the bigger man was pushing himself to a seated position, reaching over to the shelf by the bed and snatching up his leather hair tie to wind it briskly round his tail.

Obi-Wan thought about protesting, then realised that the only thing he wanted to protest was the loss of the incredibly tantalising tickle Qui-Gon's hair on his flesh would bring. He was far too lethargic to object to anything else his master cared to do to him. In fact, he felt rather decadent, lying there decorously dressed from the waist up, naked from the waist down, and with no intention of lifting a single finger to change that condition.

Qui-Gon turned back, and his eyebrows rose at the sight of Obi-Wan, still partly dressed; his hands, fiddling with the tie, went still.

"Do you want to retract your request, Obi-Wan? You're under no obligation..."

Qui-Gon broke off as Obi-Wan stretched, slowly, bringing up his arms in one long, sinuous movement to rest above his head.

"If you want me undressed, my Master, you'd best do it yourself. I couldn't move any more than a Sithulian sea slug." Languidly he stretched again, in brazen contradiction of his previous words.

From under his lashes, he watched Qui-Gon take in the blatant tease -- and surge into action. Unceremoniously he was rolled onto his front and his tunic was whipped off over his head, an action much facilitated by his current position. Then a beard was scratching its way down over his shoulderblade, followed by a soft, hot mouth.

"I don't know what tickles more, your hair or your beard," Obi-Wan said dreamily, stretching into the bedclothes this time.

"I'm told the beard," Qui-Gon interrupted his mouthing of Obi-Wan's ribs to reply. "Did you know you have freckles down your spine, Padawan?"

"I'm told they're quite appealing." He felt Qui-Gon's teeth trace a bump of bone in the middle of his back. The tug went directly through his body to his navel, making him catch his breath and starting his penis swelling again, impossible so soon after the powerful orgasm he'd just experienced. But then, he'd never thought he'd be given fellatio by his master, either; this was clearly a night filled with impossibilities.

By now, Qui-Gon had reached the soft fuzz near the base of his spine, just before the swelling of his hips began. Qui-Gon wasn't biting anymore; he was licking instead, gentle flicks of his tongue stirring the tiny hairs there. There was none of the easy familiarity with Obi-Wan's body that DeeDee or Hestia had shown earlier that night, but the tentative little licks were infinitely more arousing. Just as his penis reached full erection, Qui-Gon changed tack, striping the tender flesh near Obi-Wan's sides with wide long swathes of wetness.

Obi-Wan squirmed at the sensation, as much to feel the brush of the sheet against his cock as to escape his master's attentions. "Do you intend to lick me all over? I did wash this evening, you know."

Qui-Gon laughed, the sound of it a rumble deep in his chest, the vibration of it a buzz between his lips and the curve of Obi-Wan's hip. "You've awoken my curiosity, Padawan. I want to know what you taste like, everywhere. Your back, your sides -- even down to the soles of your feet."

If this was the result of Qui-Gon's curiosity, he shuddered to think what effect the man's passion might have: he'd be devoured alive. Perhaps it was time to lay down some boundaries. "Touch my balls all you want, but the feet are off-limits."

"Ah, I'd forgotten how ticklish you are. Perhaps I'd best confine my attentions to somewhere they might be appreciated." There was a suggestion of a tongue flicking against the beginning of the cleft between his buttocks.

Obi-Wan gave a soft moan, obligingly spreading his legs a little wider when Qui-Gon nudged his thigh with one hand. He moaned again as the hand continued down, stroking to the back of one knee with firm, assured pressure. "Checking out your handiwork?" he asked, as Qui-Gon kneaded the muscles in his calf.

"My handiwork?"

"I am as you made me, my Master. Anything you find here is your doing."

"Nonsense," Qui-Gon replied brusquely. "You made yourself, Obi-Wan, from your own hard work, your own determination and courage. I wouldn't steal that credit from you. It is curious, though, to see how you have changed. There is much here to admire." He slid his hand back up the other leg, coming to rest with fingers very near Obi-Wan's sac.

"That area's particularly appreciative of admiration," Obi-Wan hinted, squirming indecisively between Qui-Gon's fingers and his mouth, which had returned to nibble at Obi-Wan's coccyx.

"Which? This?" Qui-Gon drifted his fingers over the delicate skin at the very base of Obi-Wan's balls. "Or this?" His teasing voice stopped as he licked, gently, into Obi-Wan's crease.

"I have to choose?" Obi-Wan said breathlessly, holding himself as still as he could, willing that tongue a little lower.

Gods, he wanted his master to rim him. He'd never once conceived of Qui-Gon's mouth on someone else's arse before, and now he was lying there, waiting for it to happen to him. The realisation had him burying his head in the bedclothes once more, a hot wave of furious flushing tingeing his skin pink all over.

He heard Qui-Gon chuckle again, a rich, warm sound. "Blushing for your greediness, Padawan? Don't worry, I'll do both soon enough."

He blushed again, relieved that Qui-Gon had misinterpreted the reason for his sudden embarrassment. "You could start just there. Oh..." as Qui-Gon did, parting the soft cheeks with gentle fingers to lick his way down in slow, luscious swipes of his tongue. "Yes..."

It was a staggeringly good feeling, despite the occasional scrape of beard on the tender flesh, and of course his master was as proficient at this as a man who could take a prick down his throat would be, setting every nerve ending in Obi-Wan's bottom screaming in anticipation.

The licking stopped abruptly.

"Who's so fond of quallia berries, Padawan? I know it's not you."

Gods. Obi-Wan had totally forgotten the flavoured lubricant he'd been prepped with earlier that evening.

"Hestia, I think," he mumbled into the sheets, blushing harder than before.

"Ah." One short, neutral syllable. "I'm not overly taken with them, myself."

Obi-Wan felt Qui-Gon's weight lift off the bed, but he couldn't bring himself to roll over and apologise for such a stunning faux pas. He doubted he could meet Qui-Gon's eyes. Coming to his master's bed, still wet with traces of his earlier attempts at lovemaking: yes, it was all understandable, but not to even have warned his master... And Qui-Gon had suddenly sounded so withdrawn.

He didn't hear any footsteps above the hum of the ventilator, but the sudden noise of a tap running water told him that his master had gone through to the lavabo while he lay there in his haze of humiliation. Miserably, he realised that Qui-Gon must be washing the taste out of his mouth. Perhaps tonight really was turning into one of the most embarrassing and frustrating of his entire apprenticeship.

He was contemplating creeping out of the big bed and making his way back to his own when a damp finger danced along his spine, sending shudders chasing after it. Qui-Gon had slipped back in as silently as he had left.

"Would you mind, Padawan, if I cleaned that stuff off you?"

Obi-Wan gave a shiver of relief, though he would have said, if asked, that it was from the chill of the water trail Qui-Gon was leaving down his back.

"Of course not, Master," he answered huskily. "Do whatever you want. And I'm so sorry I-- "

"Hush," Qui-Gon told him. "You hardly intended this when you knocked on my door. But I'd prefer to taste you, rather than some dubiously flavoured muck. Hestia must have a very sweet tooth."

That make Obi-Wan laugh. "He never grew out of it the way I did."

"How's this? Too cold?" Qui-Gon began wiping a damp cloth between Obi-Wan's legs, the warmed material surprisingly soft against the folds of skin round his testicles. His balls shifted under Qui-Gon's hand.

"No, it's blissful. What is that you're using?"

"Microtex: it's made from the same stuff as the microgaunts, I believe. Very thin, very fine." The cloth was now dabbing against his perineum, a sensation not unlike Qui-Gon's own tongue flicking his skin. His master was being so careful, so gentle, but he was an adult male; he wouldn't break.

"You can rub harder, if you want."

The pressure against him increased a little, but not as much as he had hoped for. Still, Qui-Gon's hand was finally moving up into the cleft, wiping it clean of all vestiges of Hestia's tastes. "Mmm. Nice."

"You must have worn out your voice, Padawan. You're much quieter this time."

A finger swaddled in the soft cloth pressed against his opening, slipping easily in with no more friction than oiled skin would have brought. He sighed, shifting his hips slightly into the touch. "What do you want me to say?"

"Tell me if you dislike it."

Obi-Wan groaned as the finger brushed in a circular pattern, stimulating every nerve ending in the sensitive anal tissues. "Not yet. Why don't you try two fingers? I might dislike it then."

Qui-Gon laughed and withdrew the cooling cloth. "That should be enough. Roll over."

His protest was ignored as Qui-Gon's hands settled on his hips, pulling him onto his back and spreading his thighs. Another wet cloth settled on his now eager penis, hotter than the last.

"Do you have an infinite supply of those?"

"One more after this. I'm saving it for something special."

Obi-Wan opened his eyes to look at Qui-Gon. His master was sitting up beside him, weight borne on one hand while he cleaned Obi-Wan's sweaty skin with the other. His face was solemn, lines of concentration marked on his brow as he explored the rises and indents of Obi-Wan's groin with the damp rag.

"I might like something special."

A sudden grin lit up Qui-Gon's features; Obi-Wan's breath caught to see it. "I hope you will, Padawan. You must say if you don't."

"Can I say if I do?"

Again that wicked smile, so uncharacteristic of his master. It made him look a different man entirely. "You won't be able to speak at all, if I do it right."

"What are you waiting for?" Obi-Wan thrust his cock into Qui-Gon's hand.

"Don't you remember? I'm due a dessert." Qui-Gon's eyes twinkled at him, and then the big head was between his thighs, licking every spot the rag had passed over with hungry enthusiasm. Obi-Wan would have shouted if he could have, but instead he made do with moaning at the drag of a wide, flat tongue over his balls, at the probe of its tip into the ticklish hollows between groin and thigh, at the nuzzling of a large, broken nose into the damp hair surrounding his cock. He lay boneless, his hands on the bed above his head, as Qui-Gon turned his body this way and that, moving a leg to get his tongue into the little cranny just so, tilting Obi-Wan's cock to one side to lick the slit at the top.

It was soothing, warming, then tantalising beyond measure. He moaned louder. "Please, my Master, I like that, I really do."

Qui-Gon's huff of laughter was a tickle against the base of his cock, setting his balls on edge. "Good." There was a wealth of satisfaction in that deep voice. "What do you say to this?"

The curling warmth of Qui-Gon's tongue retraced the path the cloth had first taken, along the division between Obi-Wan's testicles to the firm swelling of his perineum beyond. "Oh, yes, that's better, that's wonderful. You wouldn't by any chance have done this before, Master?"

"Impudent brat." Teeth nipped gently at him, then Qui-Gon rolled him on his side, manoeuvring Obi-Wan's leg up at an angle. He settled on the bed beside his padawan. "Can you stay like that?"

"Surely," Obi-Wan sighed in satisfaction, letting the weight of his limb balance into the socket of his hip. He'd always liked being taken in this position: it spoke to him of long, slow loving, gentle thrusts with no demands behind them.

But Qui-Gon wasn't there to fuck him. That clever tongue was on him again, tracking up from his perineum to his crack; but, if either of them were to pay attention to duty, it would be a cock brushing against his anus now.

Obi-Wan screwed up his will to make the offer he ought.

"You can try again, if you want."

Qui-Gon stopped. "Do you want me to?" He hadn't needed to ask what Obi-Wan meant.

"In all honesty, no. We should, but I'm enjoying this too much--"

"And so am I," Qui-Gon said firmly, cutting off any further discussion. "Live in the moment, Padawan. We can fret about all that tomorrow." His tongue flicked against Obi-Wan's opening, a tiny jab of wetness. "And I'd prefer not to have you tighten up against me just yet."

Immediately Obi-Wan reached down, fingers digging in to one buttock to pull his bottom cheeks further apart. "I won't, Master. Put your tongue in me: I want it there."

He heard Qui-Gon's breath catch, then there was another hand spreading him from below, and Qui-Gon's mouth was back, beard scratchy against the sensitive flesh but Obi-Wan didn't care, as long as that fleshy probe pushed into him -- and it did, wriggling and squirming into him, agile and quick like the dart of a reptile's tongue, greedily lapping.

"Qui-Gon," he gasped, "my Master, please, slow down. It's t-too fast. I want to feel you."

Immediately Qui-Gon's movements eased, becoming long strokes in and out of Obi-Wan's sphincter, deliberate and thorough enough that Obi-Wan could make out the curl of the tip as it passed through the flexing ring, the slight roughness at the sides, the smoothness below...

Languorous, delicate, that tongue pierced him deep.

"Yes," he whispered in pleasure. "Like that. Don't rush the moment. Oh, good, so good, didn't know you could do that..." Long shudders began to wrack Obi-Wan's body. His master took his time, responding to the slow pattern of the tremors to set his pace. Other than the trembling, Obi-Wan lay totally still, eyes closed as he focussed on the sound of Qui-Gon's deep breathing.

The shudders intensified as Qui-Gon's hand slipped between his legs and over his cock, covering it with the last warm cloth. The heat of it was marvellous. When the warmth began to dissipate, Qui-Gon gripped him through the cloth and began to masturbate him with it in the same slow rhythm, a perfect complement to the hot, soft tongue in Obi-Wan's anus. It slithered up and down his flesh, warm and wet and wonderful pressure.

"Aaah." Obi-Wan was held on a knifepoint of pleasure between the two sensations, his body passive between them yet startlingly aware. Some moment soon he would slip, falling into ecstasy, but he wouldn't go just yet... Beneath him the sheet crinkled with the movements of Qui-Gon's hand. His own braid brushed his nipple in time to the rhythm, the barest touch like sandpaper against the delicate nub. A drop of water fell from the rag to his thigh, spilling over the curve to the bed...

He came. It was between the end of one long shudder and the beginning of the next, yet it went on forever. Qui-Gon caught his semen in the warm cloth, but the seed itself hardly seemed relevant, for it was his whole body climaxing at the last.

Qui-Gon withdrew his long tongue and sat up, slipping Obi-Wan over onto his back once more. He lay there shivering for some time afterwards, his eyes closed, until a kiss brushed his nipple.

"Obi-Wan." The summons was very quiet. "Don't you think it is time for you to go to bed?"

"I can't move." It wasn't a tease: Obi-Wan had only just managed the effort needed for speech. "Let me sleep here, Master. Or take me to my own bed. I don't care. But don't make me move."

Qui-Gon sighed. "If you think I have the energy to carry you after that, Padawan, you overrate my abilities. Stay there, then."

Reprieved, Obi-Wan lay motionless as Qui-Gon stirred around him, folding Obi-Wan's discarded clothes into a neat pile on a chair, placing his boots underneath, and collecting the cloths into a basin he had carried through from the lavabo.

"Up a bit, now." For all he had claimed he was incapable, Qui-Gon seemed to have no problems levitating Obi-Wan a few inches while he stripped the torn sheet out from under him, settling him down nearer the pillows. A new sheet was tucked round him, crisp cotton with the starch still a rich aroma in the fibres, then the warmth of the coverlet was drawn over him.

"Wh's pil'ws?" Obi-Wan mumbled hopefully.

Qui-Gon sighed again, but Obi-Wan heard the door open, and a few moments later Qui-Gon was back with Obi-Wan's pillows, much softer and fluffier than his own. "Mmmm. Thank you. For everything."

"You're welcome, my Padawan." Qui-Gon turned off the light and slipped in beside him. "Sleep well."

Of course, Obi-Wan could not go to sleep at all.

He'd been allowed to share Qui-Gon's bed a number of times before, usually in illness. Then there had been the month after Reeft's death when his nightmares woke him so frequently that Qui-Gon insisted he sleep nearby, so his master could soothe him in his dreams. And last year, after that terrible trip to Brahas, even back in the safety of the Temple they had clung to each other for the first few nights, sleeping together without needing to discuss it.

So the big bed was no novelty to him; nor was the soft breathing of his master just an arm's length away. But there were too many thoughts chasing themselves in his mind to drop off easily, now that the sharp urgency of sexual need had been slaked. From the awareness he had of Qui-Gon in the Force, the same was true of the older man. Perhaps they could talk, instead. For there was a question that, now he thought of it, Obi-Wan was surprised he had never asked before.

"What was your Ritual like, Master?"

"Hmmm?" Qui-Gon replied sleepily.

"Your Ritual. We've talked a lot about Xanatos, but we haven't talked at all about you. You must have done the Ritual, yes?"

"Yes." For all the short reply, Qui-Gon sounded more awake now.

"So? What was it like?" When his master didn't immediately reply, Obi-Wan prompted, "Was it about submission, like Xanatos'?" If it had been, Obi-Wan could only assume it had been a lesson imperfectly learnt.

Qui-Gon sighed. "There are many kinds of submission, Obi-Wan. You think of it too literally: you see it as obedience to the Council, or to the Code. You want to know what you need to do, and then do it, all the guidelines clearly laid out for you, transgressions easy to judge. Everything is black and white with you."

"Is that so wrong?"

"No, though it can be a weakness, if it makes you fearful to act on your feelings when the situation requires you to form an interpretation of your own. But we've broached that question before -- and will again, if you are to be knighted one day." That day seemed more distant now than it had in the two years preceding.

Qui-Gon shifted onto his back. "The submission Xanatos needed to make was not to the rules of the Order, although he saw it in those terms. He was being asked, instead, to submit himself to something far more demanding: to the ideal of being a Jedi. He had to take into himself the highest aspirations of our Order and make them his, as he would take my seed into his body."

"A Jedi must have the deepest commitment, the most serious mind," murmured Obi-Wan, resting his head by Qui-Gon's shoulder.

"It was time for him to commit himself wholly to the Force, to allow it to chart the course of his life. Not an arid list of proscriptions, Padawan, but a goal to be strived for, every day with all your heart and mind." Qui-Gon must have smiled, for his voice was warm as he said, "Not that I need to tell you that, my Padawan, for you do it as naturally as breathing." Obi-Wan blushed in the dark. "For all his ability in manipulation of the Force -- and he was naturally more gifted at that than either you or I -- he found such commitment hard. Eventually, it proved beyond him."

"I can't imagine you ever needed to learn that kind of submission, Master." Obi-Wan did not plan to discuss Xanatos the whole night.

"Not that kind, no. But I had my own weaknesses."

Obi-Wan made an enquiring sound.

"I was found late, not like you. Yoda didn't stumble across me until I was five. And by that time, I had developed some ... bad habits. He worked hard during my early training to correct them, but with mixed success. I didn't really want to let go of them. I didn't understand the need."

Qui-Gon paused for so long that Obi-Wan wondered if he would continue.

"It's alright, Master. You don't have to confess to them if you don't want to."

"It's not that. Any faults of mine you haven't uncovered over the last six years can hardly be grievous, after all." He continued slowly, " But, if I tell you this story, I don't want you to think less of Yoda for it."

"Master Yoda? Why should I do that?" Obi-Wan propped himself up on one arm, trying to see his master's features in the dark. "Because I was so opposed to doing the Ritual with another master? Of course I understand that it was totally different for you and Yoda. I hardly expected him to have taken you through the Ritual himself, after all." Obi-Wan gave a small laugh. "That's what the different species dispensation is for, isn't it? And if you two don't count as different species..."

"No. In fact, we don't. If you remember your earlier lessons, the dispensation is normally only granted when the master and the padawan do not share an understanding of the symbolism behind the rite of penetration. Yoda's species is fully aware of that symbolism, as is mine."

"But, even so, Master Yoda isn't really of a size to..."

"Size matters not."

"Surely you're joking, Qui-Gon. Yoda wouldn't..."

Obi-Wan petered out in the face of Qui-Gon's silence.

"Master?" he whispered, "he didn't... he couldn't have..."

"He did."

Obi-Wan collapsed back down on the bed.

"Oh."

"You didn't expect that, did you, young man?"

"I can't say that I did," he replied feebly, his mind still trying to conjure up the image of Qui-Gon. With Yoda. Teetering between two opposing reactions, he couldn't think of anything else to say. Qui-Gon might find his utter disbelief upsetting, but hysterical laughter wasn't the right reponse, either...

"Trained for the unexpected, a Jedi should be," Qui-Gon said, in a passable imitation of his diminutive master, tipping Obi-Wan over into a shout of laughter.

He smothered his face in the pillow to stifle the next one, before he could bring himself to say, "There is no training thorough enough to cope with that idea, Master!"

Qui-Gon chuckled. "Don't tell me you never wondered whether he had, because I won't believe you."

"It was certainly a topic of conversation amongst my friends when we first got told about the Ritual," Obi-Wan confessed. "They all dared me to ask you, but you can imagine what I said to that."

"You were a very reserved boy, when it came to sex. Surprising how quickly that changed."

Obi-Wan ignored the small gibe; Qui-Gon was probably entitled to it, given Obi-Wan's laughter at his own expense a moment previously. "I didn't think it could be true, or if it was, that he'd done it -- oh, I don't know. Maybe using a dildo, the way a female master would, or just using the Force to give you the sensation..."

"No. He did it with his own body."

Obi-Wan sat back up, saying in tones of triumphant discovery, "So Master Yoda does have a--"

He broke off abruptly, as the visual image to match his thoughts crashed into his head.

"A cock?" Qui-Gon completed calmly. "Yes, he does. Oh, don't worry, Padawan, your circle of friends are certainly not the first to have contemplated that great question of the universe. Mine were, too, and even more eager to have me ask Yoda if he planned to use it on me. Unlike you, however, I was able to work up the courage and pose the question."

"And he told you yes," Obi-Wan said, settling back down on one elbow to listen in fascination.

"He did. But the details -- he was as deliberately obscure about those as only Yoda can be. Just as well; perhaps he sensed even then that it would be difficult."

"Master?" Obi-Wan touched Qui-Gon's shoulder diffidently, curiosity suddenly tempered by the memory of Qui-Gon's initial reluctance to tell the tale. "How bad was it?" For he knew his master's habit of understatement.

Qui-Gon sighed and rolled onto his stomach, away from Obi-Wan. "I'd spent too many years developing my use of the Force on my own before Yoda took me in hand. You know the Living Force has always come easily to me. Before Yoda found me and chose me as his apprentice, I had virtually no awareness of the Unifying Force at all. His training helped, but often I would fall back on the Living Force when I should have been reaching out to the Unifying, or trying to balance them both within me. It's like using any pair of muscles in your legs or arms. If you overdevelop one, you risk damaging the other, and my sense of the Living Force was developed well beyond the norm. Yoda chided me for it many times, but maintaining a balance was beyond me. I failed often, and as I grew more powerful in the Force and more complex tasks were given to me, the danger inherent in those failures grew. It became clear to both Yoda and myself that, if I couldn't control this problem, I would not take my Trials.

"I came to the Ritual a little younger than you, Padawan, barely eighteen. I hadn't completed all the intermediate level yet, but Yoda decided we had to cure me of my reliance on the Living Force before my training went much further. So he packed me onto a small cargo craft, borrowed a couple of utility droids from a Senate representative he knew, and we set off for the Rim. He wouldn't tell me very much, merely that we were on course for a sun on the edge of the Lirring sector. It only had one small satellite, more moon than planet, with hardly any atmosphere of its own. I looked it up during the flight: it was utterly isolated, parsecs from the nearest inhabited system.

"I'd assumed the droids were there because, much as Yoda hates them, he hates flying a ship even more. But when we landed, he had the droids set up a biobubble, the sort which will keep you alive for a few weeks in an emergency. Then he levitated a huge boulder into the bubble and chained me to it."

"He did what?" Obi-Wan interrupted in astonishment.

"He asked me to strip off all my clothes. He took away my commlink, my utility belt, my lightsabre... the last was the worst. I felt completely bereft without it. Then he had me lie face down on the boulder, my arms and legs spread out, and he created manacles from the stone itself. I'd thought the power he had demonstrated lifting the boulder was impressive enough, but to watch him carve the rock with his mind, moulding it around my wrists like toffee, was awesome. He is much weaker now than he was then."

The antipathy towards Yoda which had stirred in Obi-Wan during Qui-Gon's quiet narration was stilled again by the sadness in his master's tone. "Is he dying?" he asked in a hushed voice.

"We all die. Even Yoda must die someday, though he will probably outlive us both. But others have written of him as unaging, unchanging, and that is no longer true. He ages, now."

"I hadn't thought of that," Obi-Wan said, lying back and reaching out to tug gently at a strand of Qui-Gon's hair. "Please, Master, continue."

Qui-Gon rolled onto his back, towards Obi-Wan once more, lying as his padawan did staring up at the dark ceiling. "When I was chained securely, he stroked my cheek and told me goodbye."

"He left you." Obi-Wan was appalled.

"Yes. He programmed one of the droids to take care of me, and it remained, but he took the ship into hyperspace and left me there. I--" there was a small break in Qui-Gon's voice, "I was very alone, Padawan."

"Did he expect you to free yourself?" Obi-Wan asked indignantly. "How could he test you like that?"

"No, I wasn't meant to escape. He wanted me to be on my own: truly on my own, many parsecs from any other being capable of symbiosis with midichlorians. And once his ship was gone, there was little point to breaking free from the rock, even if I could have managed it. But my attention was focussed elsewhere. It wasn't long before I yearned for the touch of the Living Force, for anyone else's Force signature other than my own. The droid was diligent, feeding me and clearing away my wastes, keeping the temperature constant for me; but it was only an R2 model, not even capable of speech.

"I began to extend my awareness as far as I could, searching for anyone, anything. I convinced myself that Yoda had brought the ship back out of hyperspace on the other side of the sun and was sitting there, monitoring me, just waiting for -- I couldn't say what, but I tried to contact him, more frantically every time, and when I could not I sent my consciousness searching in ever-increasing circles. I believe I might have touched a nearby star, but there was no-one there."

To think of Qui-Gon, younger than Obi-Wan was now, frightened and alone... "How long did he leave you for?"

"I could not tell, for I measure my life in the heartbeats of others. By the end, my own midichlorians were beginning to die, cut off from the vitality of the rest of the Force. I even tried to instil something of myself into the droid, in the desperate hopes of having another living being with me... I must have been nearly insane when Yoda came back."

"But -- we've spent time abandoned in space before. You've always coped."

"Even now, I would find it hard in as isolated a place as that. Then, I had no resources within myself to help me survive. I couldn't draw on the Unifying Force as I needed to, for only the Unifying Force can bridge the great expanses of time and space, and all my strength came from life alone. That was what Yoda was attempting to cure."

"So he knew there was a risk you might react like that." Obi-Wan could not help but wonder at Yoda's cruelty, even though he knew Qui-Gon did not want him to judge the old Jedi master.

"He probably hoped my own desperation would carve a path through to the Unifying Force. But, since it hadn't... The moment he came out of hyperspace, I was instantly aware of him. My mind surged to meet his, almost overwhelming in its need. I wanted the touch of his Life Force; I was ready to rip it from him, so urgent was that desire. If it had been anyone other than Yoda, I might well have overpowered and killed them, I think. But he shielded against me and threw me back into myself, keeping me chained there in spirit as securely as the stone shackles held my body fast to the rock. I didn't even know the precise moment he entered the bubble, until I felt the touch of his body against my thigh. So light, Padawan: he weighs less than a child, but in the Force his presence bore me down. I called out his name, and at that moment he opened all his shields to me, his mind overwhelming mine as his body pierced deep inside me."

"What was it like?" Obi-Wan whispered.

"Fire." Qui-Gon was silent for a moment.

"I screamed, enough to bring the droid rushing up to help me, but Yoda disabled it and tore through my own shields, such as they were, just as he was tearing into my body. And for all the pain I welcomed it, latching onto him with a hunger, pulling his mind into my own; but even in that moment he was the stronger one, and he had locked away whatever part of him holds the Living Force from my grasp. Instead, he drove into me the core inside himself where the Unifying Force resides. At any other time, I do not think I could have accepted it, but I was so eager, so open, I enveloped it all, and in a moment he was spilling his semen into me, to fill me even further. It burnt like acid, more caustic than any human's, eating its way into me. Yet my body responded to it, wasting my own seed onto the rock."

"You came? In the middle of all that?"

"I hadn't exactly expected it myself." Qui-Gon's tone was dry. "I passed out afterwards, it was such an earthshattering experience. Literally so; when I came to, the boulder was in smithereens around me. Yoda said it had just imploded under the stress of the Forces we brought to bear against it, the shackles round my wrists and ankles disintegrating into dust. I was in no position to ask him at the time, mind; he told me that later, on the way home."

Obi-Wan sighed. "It seems a drastic teaching method, Master."

"I had driven myself into a drastic position, Padawan, by my unwillingness to open myself up to all aspects of the Force. This was my submission to the Unifying Force, and even then it was not complete. My body fought against the injection of Yoda's midichlorians carried with his semen into my bloodstream: I fell into a long fever, tossing and turning on the bunk in the cargoship while Yoda cared for me. He would not even let the droids tend me, for fear that my body would reject the midichlorians in his absence. I remember his hands cool on my forehead, and his voice persuading me to drink. It took three days for the fever to die down, but many more before I regained my previous strength in the Force."

"You were weaker in the Force?" That was unexpected. "Surely the Unifying Force could only serve to strengthen you?"

"Over time it did, but I had to learn how to use it. Yoda took us to Dagobah: it was a balm for my soul having all that life around us again, and he was anxious not to endanger my connection to the Living Force either. There, he taught me how to control the gift he had given me. We grew very close in those months. Before, he had always been my master; now he was a part of me. At last I could begin to understand him, as well as to love him."

"Is that what this Ritual might bring us, then?" Obi-Wan asked. "Will I finally begin to understand you?"

Qui-Gon chuckled. "Perhaps we should leave such a daunting task to your Trials. Haven't you run out of questions yet?"

"I think I might have." As much as Obi-Wan wanted to consider the story he had just been told, his body was choosing sleep. He yawned into the pillow. "Can we talk about this some more, Master, when I'm awake again?"

"Whenever you want, Padawan," Qui-Gon replied gently. "But for now I think you should sleep."

Obi-Wan succumbed to the Force suggestion without the slightest protest.

Late in the cool of the night, he roused suddenly from a dream he couldn't remember, to a rhythm he did. Qui-Gon was a bulky black shadow across the bed, his back turned to Obi-Wan, but there was no mistaking that familiar jerking of the arm slung low on his hip. His master was utterly silent, his breathing so shallow it didn't register over the low hum of the ventilation system, yet Obi-Wan knew from the intensity of the movement that he was close to climax.

And the same sense of wrongness that had dogged Obi-Wan each time they'd attempted the Ritual was gnawing at his stomach now.

"Qui-Gon," he breathed, and in his master's surprised gasp he leant up on one arm and put the other around the older man, stilling the hand wrapped round his penis.

Qui-Gon gasped again, thrusting out his hips against Obi-Wan's fingers in an instinctive response that sent the head of his cock nestling into Obi-Wan's palm. Just as instinctively, Obi-Wan's fingertips curled around the shaft, slipping gently under the glans. The foreskin there was soft as skeins of lambswool, more delicate than he had ever imagined any part of his battle-scarred master to be. Qui-Gon moaned at his touch.

"Hush, and stay still, my Master," Obi-Wan said, shaken by the sound, and by the deep, panting breaths which were now clearly audible in the quiet night.

But Qui-Gon groaned again in protest and butted his cock once more into Obi-Wan's palm. Sticky warm liquid oozed from the slit at its tip onto Obi-Wan's skin, the length of the shaft sliding through Obi-Wan's fingers.

"No," Obi-Wan said a little more sternly, although inside he ached in sympathy. "Please stop."

Firmly he detached himself from the probing phallus and wrapped his fingers round Qui-Gon's wrist instead, carrying both their hands back up across Qui-Gon's chest, out of temptation's way. This time Qui-Gon's moan was more plaintive, obedient but forlorn, and he curled up around Obi-Wan's arm as if for comfort, his chest heaving.

The movement pulled Obi-Wan closer, pressing his torso against the bare skin of Qui-Gon's back, his own groin against Qui-Gon's buttocks where his master's leggings rode low on his hips. Abruptly he was very aware of the thinness of the cloth separating them, of the beginnings of a warm cleft uncovered above it where his own penis was softly snuggling in. He was grateful that he was incapable of a further erection that night, given the circumstances.

"I'm sorry. I really am." He held Qui-Gon harder, realising that the big man's heart was pounding beneath his hand, and that the skin down Qui-Gon's back was damp with sweat. "It's hardly fair that I'm allowed my relief, but you aren't allowed yours."

Qui-Gon shuddered at that, but he kept still beneath Obi-Wan's arm, only his laboured breathing stirring his body. Finally, when he had quieted even that, he asked in a voice husky and low,

"Why not?"

"Not this way," Obi-Wan whispered. "It would be wrong. It would go against the Ritual -- the Force -- I don't know, but something inside me just tells me it would be wrong."

Obi-Wan expected him to argue against such an amorphous feeling, but after a moment Qui-Gon heaved a deep sigh, his muscles relaxing. "This Ritual is very hard," he said sadly.

"I know," Obi-Wan said, his own voice filled with regret. "Go to sleep. It will be easier than staying awake, wanting it."

"Alright, my Padawan. I'll try." Qui-Gon sighed again and turned his head into the pillows.

Obi-Wan placed a gentle kiss between his shoulderblades, and nudged him into sleep with a delicate touch of the Force. Once Qui-Gon's breathing was deep and regular, Obi-Wan extricated his arm from his master's loosened clasp and rolled over onto his own pillows, himself reluctant to drift into sleep so quickly.

He had learned so much this evening: enough to overwhelm him, but for the discipline that the Unifying Force brought to his tumbling thoughts. And with the clarity it lent his mind, he knew one fact was pre-eminent. Yoda was dying.

Perhaps Obi-Wan himself might perish long before the oldest of the Jedi breathed his last, but Obi-Wan's entire life could not fail to be overshadowed by that sole truth. The most powerful of them all was weakening, and who knew what shadows would come once his Light failed. Is that what had moved Yoda to treat his best beloved padawan so harshly, in an attempt to forge the weapon of Light Qui-Gon had become? Qui-Gon had returned from his Ritual as an apprentice not yet even a senior, but with a formidable grasp of both aspects of the Force. It had set him apart from most other Jedi, who never achieved such synthesis combined with such power; it had set him in opposition to those who resented the achievement in one so young.

Obi-Wan shivered with an intimation of the horrors Yoda might already have foreseen attendant on his death, which would require a warrior like Qui-Gon to face them.

If his master survived the next year.

Unwilling just yet to face the full implications of that thought, Obi-Wan curled up with the sheet tucked tightly around him, his cheek pillowed on his hand. The smell of Qui-Gon's semen on his palm followed him into sleep.

Obi-Wan woke the next morning with cold, empty sheets beside him, and a hard determination in his heart.

Pushing aside the covers, he picked up his master's bathrobe which lay abandoned on a chair by the bed, and wrapped it around himself, the faded green cotton soft on his skin. The slight chill in the air told him it was still early, although Qui-Gon seemed to have been up for some time.

But instead of seeking out his master, he strode through into the lavabo. The sun was not yet high in the sky, the light slanting through the big windows to shine on the walls opposite, making the white tiles gleam. Obi-Wan discarded the robe in a heap on the floor and stepped into the shower cubicle, turning on a hot, fierce stream of water. As he scrubbed, he rehearsed his arguments, grim obstinacy tightening his jaw.

They were going to finish this thing today.

He watched the suds slither down the drain, then sent a stream of urine following them before he rinsed everything away.

He found Qui-Gon in the study, kneeling on the thick woollen rug in meditation. His master did not stir when he entered; breathing deep and slow, the older Jedi seemed carved from stone, features sharply delineated in the morning light, hands resting on his thighs. Unlike Obi-Wan, who still only wore the robe, he had dressed in leggings, a tunic and sash. But the clothing was still too light for the early morning air; when Obi-Wan squatted beside him and brushed one finger against his hand, his skin was cold to touch.

For a few moments, Obi-Wan remained crouched, staring at the closed eyes, the thin mouth. He had seen this face for years, had come to take it for granted as a constant in his life. What would happen if he were never to see it again? A Jedi was not to be ruled by fear, but Obi-Wan had to admit that the horrible, grasping feeling at the pit of his stomach, the one pushing him inexorably towards an unwished-for course of action, most assuredly was fear.

All around him he sensed open avenues closing, as if the myriad possibilities of his future were shrinking away from him. He had woken with the knowledge that he must act, now, or lose it all; and by the Force, he would act.

Stiffening his back, he straightened to his feet. Qui-Gon's calmness in meditation was almost an affront, a cool rebuke for his own histrionics. Was his master so genuinely untouched by the eddies of the future around them? Were Obi-Wan's fears unfounded, his determinations unnecessary?

No, he thought not. By the desk, the lights of the commslink were blinking steadily.

Obi-Wan flipped up the screen and read the message Qui-Gon had left open, a short note from Yoda received in the early hours of the morning. Yoda regretted, but the Council had dismissed both Master Jinn's petitions. Would Master Jinn report to them that afternoon, and would he bring Padawan Kenobi with him.

It was not phrased as a question.

Obi-Wan was hit by a sudden, uncharacteristic wave of panic, and he grasped the edge of the desk for balance as the blood rushed to his head. This was what the Force had whispered to him in his early morning dreams. The time for care and delicacy was past.

"You've seen it, then?" Qui-Gon's voice made him start.

He turned to find his master's eyes open and alert, staring at him assessingly. Qui-Gon's presence in the Force was well-shielded, but Obi-Wan could sense a tension that hadn't been apparent while he sat in meditation. Its flavour was the same as Qui-Gon often exuded just before battle: a building energy like a dam about to burst. It belied the graven calm of his face.

"I assumed you meant me to. When did you read it?"

"Some while ago. It seemed pointless to wake you at that hour, since there's nothing for us to do till this afternoon."

"There is, and you know it."

Blue eyes drilled into him. "Say what you mean."

"You know," he repeated, more emphatically. "Why are you pretending otherwise? We have to go through with the Ritual. Now."

An odd expression touched his master's face: guarded, and yet warmed by a flickering hope. "You think last night changed things, then?"

"No." Qui-Gon's face lost that little warmth with Obi-Wan's stark honesty. "But I think last night may serve to make this morning more tolerable. Either way, it is time for us to do this, Master."

"It would be rape." Qui-Gon's voice was flat and hard, his mouth severe. But Obi-Wan did not flinch from the word.

"Yes, on a physical level." Qui-Gon turned his face away and Obi-Wan took a hasty step forward, falling on one knee in front of him. "But not on the level of my heart, Master! It isn't rape if I'm willing. You know I give my body freely to you, so that we both can achieve this!" He put his hand on Qui-Gon's shoulder, willing his master to turn back to him. "Please, Master Qui-Gon, stop and think for a moment."

Qui-Gon shook his head impatiently, but he didn't shrug off Obi-Wan's hand. "I've been worrying at it for hours this morning, with no result. The Force has abandoned me in this, Obi-Wan. I can't see any way forward other than to do this, yet I know it's not right: I would still be forcing your body, even if you are willing. How could I exonerate myself afterwards?"

"No-one will ask you to defend yourself. As long as you can truthfully say we've undertaken the Ritual, the Council will let it pass: it will suit them too well to accept the outward show, if not the inward reality."

"Damn the Council!" Qui-Gon turned to glare at Obi-Wan. "How can I square it with myself? I have done enough wrongs to haunt me at nights without adding this to the list."

"But maybe, my Master, that's what the Force is willing you to do. After all," he added gently, "the Force is not always kind. It demands hard things of every Jedi."

"Why this of me, Obi-Wan?" Qui-Gon whispered. "Why would the Force demand such a thing of us both?" There was an urgency to the question, but also a helplessness, as if Qui-Gon for once had no answers and was forced to look to his padawan for them.

"Perhaps it's the lesson I need to learn, whether or not you want to teach it to me. Consider, Master," he pleaded, "Xanatos needed to understand submission, you needed to understand balance. But me? You've accused me of idealism in the past, of making everything black and white. Maybe I need to understand that sometimes the choices the Force has to offer me will be between bad and worse. Maybe I need to know that I'll be hurt. Maybe I need to know that I will hurt others in the search for what is right, or that I will ask them to do things they consider wrong." He paused. "As I am asking you now."

"It seems you've already understood that lesson well enough." Qui-Gon said hardly.

"Knowing is not understanding. I know it well enough to recite it back to you, but it's a rote learning only. I don't understand it." He clenched his fist against his heart. "I don't carry it here. After this, I think I will."

"And will you carry as close to your heart the memory that it was me who taught it to you?"

"As I carry the memory of every time you hit me with a 'sabre in practice, or pushed me to run when I had no breath left, to climb when every muscle was aching. It is all part of your training me to be the best Jedi you can make me, and I thank you for it, every day."

He brushed his fingers against the bristles of Qui-Gon's beard, before rising to his feet. "Master Jinn, do your duty. Take your padawan through this Ritual."

Qui-Gon bowed his head for a long moment before he, too, stood up, his movements slow in comparison to Obi-Wan's litheness. His mouth set in a tight line, he said, "I will do my duty, but it is the hardest thing you have asked me for in the six years we have been together."

"I know." Obi-Wan fumbled in the pocket of the gown, pulling out the tube of gel he had brought in with him. "Just remember one thing. I'm not Xanatos. I won't ever begrudge you this. And one day I hope you can find it in your heart not to begrudge it of me."

He put the tube in Qui-Gon's hand. "Prepare yourself. Please?"

Qui-Gon nodded, a curt, short gesture. He turned away from Obi-Wan, staring instead at the sunlight dappling the shelves of books as he began to adjust his clothing.

This wasn't last night, with its intimacy and its frankness, and its swift, sweet pleasures. There would be no teasing, there would be no tingling of lust to ameliorate the hurt. There would only be duty and pain. Seeing the rigid set of Qui-Gon's shoulders, Obi-Wan was nearly overwhelmed by a sudden urge to call the whole thing to an end. But that was not the way, he was sure of it, with the kind of bedrock certainty he rarely experienced but Qui-Gon knew so well. A Jedi shirked neither duty nor pain, and a Jedi he was meant to be.

He turned aside and pulled out the chair from the desk, putting it away in a corner. Making sure to keep his eyes averted from his master's preparations, he slipped the robe from his shoulders, folding it into a neat bundle which he placed on the desk. Naked now, his penis flaccid against his scrotum, he bent over the polished surface till his stomach was flat against it, his face buried in the soft cotton of the robe.

The cloth was still warm and damp with the moisture from his shower. It smelt of sharp carbolic and very slightly of Qui-Gon, a heavier, muskier scent trapped in its folds. Qui-Gon had owned this robe for as long as Obi-Wan had known him. The first time he'd seen the Jedi Master at ease, lounging on a sofa in their quarters, Qui-Gon had been wearing it. The sight of him like that, no longer wrapped in the cloak of his office but in a bathrobe faded and fraying even then, had been a naive young Obi-Wan's introduction to the idea that Masters could be human, too.

Breathing in the comforting smell, Obi-Wan kept that image of his master in his mind as he waited, his knees apart, his thighs braced against the desk. If he thought of Qui-Gon like that, feet up on the couch reading some trashy comic poet, perhaps this would seem less dehumanising for them both.

"I'm going to stretch and lubricate you now, Padawan."

He didn't shift to look at Qui-Gon. It seemed safer to keep his head buried in the circle of his arms. The pillow of the robe muffled his voice when he spoke, "I don't think that'll make much difference."

"Nevertheless."

"It might make it worse. I did put some gel on before I came in. Master, I'd really rather you just went ahead."

He heard Qui-Gon's deep sigh. "Alright. If that's the way you want to do it." The tube of gel was placed on the desk beside him. "I might need to hold you in place. Obi-Wan, you can always stop me. It doesn't matter how far I've gone: just call out and I'll stop. Promise me you'll do that if you need me to?"

"I promise."

He felt the soft drag of Qui-Gon's leggings against the backs of his calves, but for a long moment nothing more. Then there was the most delicate of touches against his spine, a tracing of fingertips in a soothing spiral across his lower back. He couldn't bear it.

"Please. Do it now."

"Give me a minute, Padawan." Qui-Gon's voice was shaking slightly but, within the minute he had promised, steady hands had dropped to Obi-Wan's buttocks. Fingers parted his bottom cheeks, firmly yet gently. Obi-Wan's eyes screwed shut, the exposed orifice below following suit in a clenching motion he couldn't control. Qui-Gon must have felt the movement of the muscles beneath his fingertips, but he put the blunt head of his cock against the opening. Obi-Wan felt the cold of the gel against his flesh, and behind it...

The pressure began. A slow, steady push, with the considerable power of Qui-Gon's body to force it home. Obi-Wan's hands bunched into fists in the cloth as the first spear of pain went straight up his spine. He'd touched Qui-Gon's prick last night, the skin soft and velvety against his fingers. But the thing pushing in now was surely not that same organ. This was a piece of iron being shoved into him with slow deliberation, the weight of it enough to force a way through the rigid sphincter. The ring of muscle squeezed as tight shut as it could, but Qui-Gon's phallus was stronger.

And it hurt so much. Little shocks of ice followed by red hot spears shot through him, radiating from the single point where his master's penis was invading. All thoughts he had had of relaxing into this were gone: he only had the strength to hold himself still under the relentless assault.

Two days ago, bent over this very desk, hard wood under his stomach, he'd actually pushed himself back onto Qui-Gon to rush the Ritual through. Today that was impossible: his entire body was helpless, consumed with the searing burn of Qui-Gon's entry against much greater resistance. It was left to Qui-Gon to determine the pace of their joining: Obi-Wan had no control left to help him. Qui-Gon's fingers dug deep into Obi-Wan's hips as he forced their two bodies together, but slowly, slowly, and Obi-Wan was desperately glad of it. He had thought it would be better faster, but now he knew he would have begged for his master to stop. If he could only hang on until it was in...

Qui-Gon pushed a little harder and Obi-Wan flinched away. It was utterly instinctive, as uncontrollable as the clenching of his anus. It was also futile: the desk stopped his forward motion almost immediately, and then Qui-Gon's fingers tightened their grip.

There was a trembling in Qui-Gon's voice as he urged, "Stay still if you can. It'll hurt worse the more often I have to enter you."

Obi-Wan wanted to tell his master that it couldn't possibly hurt worse. He'd known greater pain when he'd been wounded, but it hadn't been a pain there, at the core of his body. It hadn't torn and splintered him from head to toe as Qui-Gon had done, poking him with slow, grim determination. But he couldn't say that, so he took a shaking breath and held it, nodding his head to show he understood.

"I'm going to try something different. This might hurt less, to begin with. Easy now, Padawan. Concentrate on the touch of my hand, the sound of my voice." Qui-Gon began to rub between his shoulderblades, the feeling a distraction, while he murmured words of comfort into the nape of Obi-Wan's neck, his lips just brushing the tiny hairs there, beard a light scratch against the skin. Slowly Obi-Wan began to relax.

But then he felt the oddest sensation, as if a cool thin tube were being slipped into his anus, narrow enough to squeeze through the tiny portal. He gasped at the intrusion, then buried his face deeper in the robe as the tube began to swell, slowly stretching the sphincter open against the force of his muscles.

He'd used the Force like this himself, in play with a lover or occasionally for his own pleasure. It was difficult to do, requiring enormous control, but the level of resistance was much more sensitively gauged through the Force than through nerves in skin. Even with Qui-Gon giving that degree of attention, it still hurt: not as ferociously as had his earlier invasion, but Obi-Wan's body still tried to deny the breach, spasming even though cheated of anything to push against. Qui-Gon had to be aware of the resistance he put up, yet the pressure grew.

"Alright, Padawan," Qui-Gon soothed. "Move for now if it helps. I'll hold you still when I'm ready again."

Grateful for any respite, Obi-Wan let his cheeks clench together in quick fits, gripping in every muscle from his anus to his testicles then pushing them out again to distract himself from the slow burn. He found that he was pushing himself up from the floor on his toes, shifting from one foot to the other as the pressure increased. He must look a fool, his buttocks jerking as if he had sat on a nest of ants, but it made the swelling inside slightly less sharp.

"Easy, Obi-Wan," came the deep, soft voice. "I know it's bad, but it'll be over soon. Try and breathe for me, even and slow now."

Obediently he sucked in a long breath while Qui-Gon's hands settled on his bottom and spread his cheeks once more. He let the pent-up breath go, then took another, steadier one. Three times he did it, and on the third exhalation Qui-Gon began to push into him once more.

It was easier than it had been before, Qui-Gon's big, blunt penis getting quick purchase in the forced opening, but then the true pressure began once the head was lodged in place. Obi-Wan lost control of his breathing again as the mild burn became a sharp prickle and then a savage scalding, the pain shooting down into his thighs and balls. Panting, he crammed a bit of the cloth into his mouth to stop himself crying out.

Surely it was in by now! Over the blood pounding in his ears, he could hear the tiny grunts his master was making as his body hitched forward minutely, stretching open the narrow passage with sheer power where the Force had been used with delicacy.

Each tiny push rubbed Obi-Wan's nipples against the polished wood of the desk. He was desperate to move, anything to try and ease the fierce fire, but Qui-Gon's hands held him inexorably in place. He bit down hard on the cloth to keep in the moans that wanted to come from him at that searing pain, the cotton dry in his mouth. Gods, but it scorched, to be stretched so against his body's will!

Most of the head had pushed through the first and second rings now. He could feel it fat and round in his anus, an alien object his body tried desperately to eject. But Qui-Gon was having none of it, his hands iron bands on Obi-Wan's thighs as he pressed inexorably home, faster now that the breach was complete. One final push, and Qui-Gon's leggings were pressed against the backs of his thighs, the hair on his groin and testicles springy against Obi-Wan's bottom cheeks. Qui-Gon's deep groan hid his own muffled scream.

"Shhh." One large hand detached from his leg to stroke his hair. "Your body will adjust. Be still for a few moments--"

Obi-Wan spat out the cloth. "No! I -- I can't take much more. Please, just come as fast as you can and get it out of me!"

The hand on his hair stilled.

A moment later, Qui-Gon moved in obedience to the plea, pulling back his hips in a quick jerk which made Obi-Wan gasp in relief. He didn't go all the way out, bringing the head of his cock only as far back as the stretched ring of muscle before he thrust in again, a long hard drive that took him deep into Obi-Wan's rectum.

"Unghh!" Obi-Wan's body arched and the cry was released before he could cover his face with the cloth again. The pain of distension sent his guts cramping: he was sure he would soil himself. But before the sensation could become intolerable, Qui-Gon was retreating once more.

Obi-Wan wanted to weep. Why did this have to be so difficult? His entire spine taut as a curved bowstring, he waited for the next thrust in.

Then, Qui-Gon's cock slipped from his body.

"Oh!" The sudden reprieve was almost a pain in itself, as his sphincter closed tightly back up. Panting, he collapsed onto the surface of the desk, the wood cool beneath his sweating body. He let his knees fold, taking the weight from his shaking legs, while he tried to recover his breath, to ready himself for the next attempt. From behind him he heard a fumbling of cloth, and then Qui-Gon's hands were on him again.

His master stroked him gently, hand trembling slightly as it passed down his spine to rest briefly over the sealed orifice hidden between his buttocks. A slight tingle in Obi-Wan's flesh told him that Qui-Gon was sending healing energies to bathe the area, though he knew there had been little physical damage done despite all the pain. Strained muscles, but no bleeding, he was sure: Qui-Gon was free to go on when he was ready.

But instead, Qui-Gon's hands closed around his shoulders, and pulled him upright.

"No, Master! You have to continue! You promised!"

But Qui-Gon was turning him, wrapping him in an embrace that brooked no opposition, arms holding him close. Qui-Gon's beard brushed his cheek, lips soft on his temple.

"I'm sorry, Obi-Wan." The apology was quietly spoken, but with a deliberation that made Obi-Wan start to shake in earnest. Qui-Gon rocked him with a gentle swaying of their bodies, arms warm around his naked padawan.

"You promised." It was a plea, not a statement, uttered into the crook of Qui-Gon's neck. There was still a hope: Obi-Wan could feel the press of Qui-Gon's erection against his belly through the cloth between them. He reached down to tug at the lacings Qui-Gon had retied, but his hand was caught and held tight against their bodies.

"Listen to me, Obi-Wan Kenobi." Qui-Gon's voice was firm, unwavering. "I may have killed many men in my life: a warrior has no choice, though by the gods I have tried to use my tongue before my sabre. And I may have done many things the precious Council would not accept, as long as the Force was my guide. But I am not a brutal man. I won't do this to you."

He pulled Obi-Wan's hand up to his mouth and brushed his lips against Obi-Wan's knuckles, before tucking his padawan more securely against him.

"Would you prefer to see me lose my Knighthood?" Obi-Wan whispered into the sheltering arms. "I've already spent enough sweat and tears getting this far with you, Master. This -- it's only physical pain. I can't count the number of times I've come out of the training salles hurting worse. Please, can't you treat it as you would any other match?"

"This isn't a training match. This is savagery. I won't do it." The finality in Qui-Gon's voice was at odds with the gentle hands stroking his hair.

Obi-Wan stood trembling, hiding his face in Qui-Gon's shoulder for a few moments until he could control himself. So this is where all the hopes of his life would end: not with a failure in the dreaded Trials, or gutted by the laserblast of some unseen enemy, but here, in the safety of Qui-Gon's embrace. He had always held a secret certainty that these common padawan nightmares would never come to pass for him, that he was destined to become a Jedi knight. Only now, with his master's betrayal, did that certainty implode, leaving him in a confusion of anger and grief. One or two tears fell furtively down his cheeks, secreting themselves in the folds of Qui-Gon's tunic.

"Ah, Obi-Wan, I am so sorry. But I can't be other than myself, even for you. You may not be able to forgive me, but before all else I must follow the Will of the Force, and then I must follow what I know to be right. This is neither." Qui-Gon hugged his padawan's unresisting body once more and released him. "One day you may see it through my eyes."

"One day, perhaps." Obi-Wan couldn't quite look him in the face. He wanted to thump Qui-Gon with his fists, to sob all over him, to beg him to reconsider. But he knew that his pleas would never sway his master. Turning away, he fumbled for the robe; he desperately needed to go off into a corner on his own for awhile.

Qui-Gon forestalled him, taking the robe from his hands to drape it around his shoulders.

"Will you meditate with me?" Qui-Gon asked gently, as he watched Obi-Wan shrug into it.

About to beg off, Obi-Wan paused. It might be their last opportunity to do so together. The cold realisation quenched some of his anger. "Of course, Master," he answered.

Qui-Gon gestured to the rug and they both sank to their knees opposite one another, Obi-Wan forgoing his usual position to mirror Qui-Gon's. Around them, the early morning sunlight played across their faces to touch the bookspines on the nearby shelves. It was brighter now, bringing warmth as well as light, picking out the deep golds and russets of the saffron and chibilla dyes in the thick woollen rug.

His master sighed, closed his eyes and tilted up his face to the light. Obi-Wan could sense him opening himself to the Force, warming it and welcoming it till the whole room thrummed faintly to its presence. In the receiving, Qui-Gon was also giving, sending back into the Force the warmth and presence of himself, till Obi-Wan could almost feel him in the kiss of the sunlight, or the sweetness of the air in his lungs. Slowly, surrounded by such serenity, Obi-Wan calmed enough to think, if not to meditate.

The worst of it was that he knew Qui-Gon was right. The flaws in his reasoning this morning had been shown up, not least by the fact that, whatever Qui-Gon Jinn might do, he could never be forced to betray his own honour. Obi-Wan smiled sourly. His padawan perhaps, but not his own honour.

Was that what Obi-Wan had to learn? To find the one right goal which overrode all others, and hold fast to it, no matter what it demanded of him? His own aims -- to complete the Ritual, to accompany Qui-Gon on his mission -- did they constitute an honourable objective?

Look at what they had entailed. A forced taking, a forced submission: these things were unworthy of both Qui-Gon and himself. He would always have known; even if he had made it to his Trials, even if he had passed them with flying colours. It would have been a canker, eating into his own sense of self-worth and souring his love for his master. He would always have questioned whether he had earned his knighthood fairly, whether he had truly forgiven Qui-Gon for the enforced submission -- and whether Qui-Gon had forgiven him. Despite his earlier reassurances to the contrary, it would have come between them.

But where did that leave Obi-Wan? He tried to sift through the few possibilities still open to him, regaining his determination as he considered them.

He would be a Jedi knight.

Whatever that entailed, he would do. He'd start with a petition of his own, that very afternoon. If the Council were determined he should not accompany Qui-Gon, then he would beg for their dispensation to spend the next year in solitary study. After all, he'd missed most of the optional classes, what with the riotous life he and Qui-Gon led.

And if they wouldn't accept that, he'd ask for a temporary master to be appointed, one who only wanted to form a light bond, possibly as a preliminary to taking on the greater responsibility of an initiate.

And if that wasn't sufficient for them, he'd take another master to knighthood. He hated the idea, but he could do it, just as he was sure he could undertake the Ritual with someone else if he had to. Six years...he shuddered at the thought, then set his jaw. If that was what the Force willed, he'd do it. And on his knighting day, he would corner his former master and ask him if he wanted a partner for the next six years, to learn all the things Qui-Gon should have taught him. Because they belonged together.

Gods, he wasn't sure he could do that. Six years -- and who was to say Qui-Gon would even be alive then, without Obi-Wan there to guard him? That, too, was a horrifying thought.

He stared at his master's face, curious. If Qui-Gon cared at all about losing Obi-Wan as an apprentice, if he was worried about going into one of the most challenging missions of his life on his own, then why did he look so beautiful?

For there was a particular beauty to a man communing with the Living Force, letting it radiate through him. Its touch was sweeter, more freely joyous than the Unifying Force's structures, as pleasing as they were in their own intricate detail. And no knight alive was more beautiful in his contemplation of the Living Force than Qui-Gon.

It was at times like these that Obi-Wan remembered to look at his master with open eyes. It was too easy, in the host of pressing, everyday requirements -- keeping oneself alive, fulfilling the next mission goal, and then the next -- to forget this other face Qui-Gon wore. His master could be infuriating in his whimsies, hurtful in his criticisms, annoyingly superior in his own self-confidence. But he was also possessed of an inner strength which shone through his harsh features: peace flowed from him, and comfort, and warmth. And Obi-Wan remembered that he loved him, and that he would miss him more than he could contemplate, if they were parted.

He bowed his head and let another tear fall. It was not only his knighthood he stood to lose today. Desperately he sought for the sense of Qui-Gon around him, surrounding him through the Force, to ease his sorrow.

The moment he sought, his Master found him, welcoming even his turbulence with as much warmth as he had the balm of the Force. Gratefully, Obi-Wan abandoned himself in their meditation.

It could only have been three or four ko more before Obi-Wan returned to rational thought -- but this time, he had banished the fears he'd let obsess him. He would concentrate on the practicalities of handling the Council and trying to improve Qui-Gon's chances of surviving Malabar; for sometimes it was better to focus on the present than belabour the future. At least he had learnt that lesson from his master.

He looked up to find Qui-Gon smiling at him.

"Such serious thoughts, Padawan." Qui-Gon touched a finger to the fine-drawn line between Obi-Wan's brows, then stood in one sure movement. "Some breakfast, perhaps? You could get out the things while I go and wash."

Obi-Wan's stomach gurgled its own response, but when he tried to get to his feet, he collapsed back down. "How can you possibly meditate for hours kneeling like this?" he moaned, rubbing his calves.

Qui-Gon laughed and stretched out a hand to help him up. "Stop being such an old man, Obi-Wan. Anyone would think I abuse you regularly, instead of just every other morning over that desk. Would you like eggs, or would you prefer honeycakes?"

In the kitchen, Obi-Wan planned his campaign while he watched Qui-Gon cook. The big man's apparent cheerfulness was somewhat off-putting: he even hummed under his breath as he cracked the eggs into a bowl and added mysterious bits of leaf from a jar to the mix. Whatever the fruits of his meditation, he had obviously found comfort in them. With Qui-Gon's resolve not to force the Ritual, the anxieties which had plagued him earlier that morning appeared to have vanished; indeed, he seemed relaxed, even happy, in the simple task of preparing their food.

He also showed no particular desire to discuss the situation with Obi-Wan; so over the meal they chatted inconsequentially about Temple gossip and petty details of Republic politics. It was only as they cleared the remains of their food away that Obi-Wan decided to broach the next point of difficulty: bettering Qui-Gon's chances of surviving the next year. "So, you'll be off to Malabar within the week. Will you follow the Council's advice and take another knight with you?"

"On consideration, I think having some backup would be best."

Gods, this was going to be harder than he'd thought. Someone else would be by Qui-Gon's side, supporting him in battle, pretending to be his lover. A nasty, spiteful spurt of jealousy gripped Obi-Wan, even as he thanked his stars that Qui-Gon was going to be sensible about this. No-one else should be by his master's side other than him -- no-one! But it was better than the alternative: Qui-Gon going on his own. Obi-Wan took a deep breath and applied himself sternly to consideration of the potential candidates.

There weren't many free knights on Coruscant at the moment. If it were Knight Chelek, Obi-Wan could at least corner him for a briefing before they left. He'd tell him that Qui-Gon should not walk long distances, since the older man was still prone to limping on that bad knee if he strained it too much. And Knight Chelek was not to let Qui-Gon persuade him into small rescue missions on the side, as was his master's wont; and he should beware, when they fought together, of Qui-Gon's tendency to carry the fight ahead instead of holding back to regroup.

Chelek wasn't too proud to take advice - Obi-Wan knew that from the time they had worked together to break the Vengoan logging cartel. If it were that arrogant, posturing Arrabas, though...

"Who will you take?"

Qui-Gon sat on the side of the counter with slow deliberation and gave him a long, considering look.

"You."

Then, perhaps because of the obvious confusion on Obi-Wan's face, he added, "I won't go on my own, and I won't accept anyone else but you, regardless of whether we complete this damned Ritual or not."

A wave of relief coursed through Obi-Wan, so strong it rocked him back on his heels. Force, that felt so right! He let it sweep him up for one heady moment before reality dragged him back under again. "But the Council refused the petition!"

Qui-Gon said lightly, "Then they will have to consider it again."

Obi-Wan gaped at the idea of such blatant defiance. Even for Qui-Gon Jinn, renown maverick, disobedience on such a level would be a new career high.

"They'll order you to go, Master. You won't have a choice."

"There are always choices, Obi-Wan. We are free men." Qui-Gon spoke quietly and clearly. "I will make my position plain to the Council in the meeting this afternoon. If they choose to send someone else, well and good: that will give us time to concentrate on the Ritual in the peace of the Temple. If they decide to send us on the mission anyway, we'll deal with the Ritual in due course."

"If we can," Obi-Wan muttered. "It's proved traumatic enough attempting it here. I don't care for the thought of trying it on a mission."

"At worst, we postpone the wretched thing till the mission is over. By that point, the Council might be willing to accept the experience you'll undoubtably have gained on Malabar as a substitute for undertaking it. Or it might even be that the problem will have gone away. Let's concentrate on our meeting with the Council in a few hours, not some dim and distant future we might not survive to enjoy, Obi-Wan."

The thought of the upcoming Council meeting, with Qui-Gon in this mood of sunny determination, made Obi-Wan want to shudder almost as much as the idea of having the Ritual hanging over his head for another year.

"Have you considered that the Council might have a totally different reaction, Qui-Gon? They might, for instance, choose to demote you, hand me over to another master and give the mission to someone less competent. What then?"

Qui-Gon shrugged. "The consequences of a failure on Malabar would be far-reaching, and the Council are well aware that I'm the best bet they have to avoid it. I'm willing to gamble they won't send anyone else."

"Master," and Obi-Wan could hear the pleading in his own voice, "don't defy the Council. Not on my behalf. My training isn't worth risking your status. If they were to strip you of your rank--"

"They wouldn't dare do it before Malabar. The mission must come first." Qui-Gon smiled, a smile Obi-Wan had seen before. It could best be described as ruthless. "Remember the first rule of negotiation, Padawan. If you have an ace, there's no point in keeping it up your sleeve when the last hand has been dealt. I think we are at that last hand now. Let's place our bets and play."

"But -- but when we talked about this yesterday morning, you decided you would only take me if the Council agreed," Obi-Wan said in bewilderment. "Now you're proposing to risk your status as a master -- or even worse, risk chaos on Malabar, with the Force knows what implications for the rest of the sector."

Qui-Gon shook his head reprovingly. "I was a fool, and a coward too, letting my concerns about the Ritual blind me to the truth. You said to me yesterday, I'm your padawan. If I couldn't trust in my own judgement, I should have trusted in yours. You've been as loyal to me as a man can be, even when you were no more than a boy. I could never doubt you. And this morning you've demonstrated a trust in me which honours me deeply, misguided as our actions were."

He stretched out a hand and caught the sleeve of Obi-Wan's tunic, tugging gently to bring Obi-Wan closer. "You said you'd accept only me as your master. Any of the others would fight for the opportunity to have you as their padawan learner, Obi-Wan." He looked up, his blue eyes fierce in his face. "But I'm a selfish man, and I want you as mine. We belong together. Will you stand up for those words when we meet with the Council this afternoon, Padawan? Will you trust in your own feelings?"

Qui-Gon would risk everything to keep him. Warmth flooded Obi-Wan, but with it came a myriad of new fears. It had never been his intention to have Qui-Gon stake his position as Knight and Master on keeping them together. And there would be hell to pay in the Council that afternoon, for once Qui-Gon Jinn had determined his way, wise men scattered in front of him.

But Obi-Wan knew where his loyalties lay. He took a deep breath and grasped the fingers playing with his sleeve. "I'll trust in us, Master" he said, his voice steady.

Qui-Gon returned the clasp, his hand warm on Obi-Wan's as he said confidently, "That will do us well enough."

Obi-Wan leaned into the touch, clinging to his master's new-found certainty. They stood there for awhile in silence, until Obi-Wan spoke again.

"Master, can't we find a way out of this confrontation?" he said slowly, thinking aloud.

"Any ideas are welcome, Padawan." Qui-Gon sighed. "I would rather negotiate our way out of this than fight with the Council over it."

"Well, you remember when you first told me about the Ritual?"

Qui-Gon smiled. "You were so young, then. Your eyes were as round as saucers at the idea."

"More at the thought of you talking about sex rather than what you were saying! I wasn't that young!"

"Maybe not." Qui-Gon's hand mussed his hair.

"You remember all those semiotics texts you set me?" Obi-Wan asked, quellingly. "Surely there's some way in which we have actually completed the Ritual, on a symbolic level at least? Even if you didn't ejaculate, you've done more than most female masters do with their padawans. If you could persuade Master Mundi of that..."

"We'd unleash an argument about substance over form amongst the Council," Qui-Gon finished, seeing where Obi-Wan's argument was going. "And we might be able to creep off to Malabar while they were at it. Hmmm. I wonder if there's anything in the Dahometh canon..."

Obi-Wan dodged to avoid having his hair ruffled again as Qui-Gon got to his feet. "Well thought, Obi-Wan. Nothing in the canon illuminated our personal problems with the Ritual, but perhaps I'll find enough ammunition to feed a small civil war between Mundi and Mace over the exact Dahometh definition of penetration." He was at the doorway when he paused to add, "But not the definition of ejaculation, I think. Even my infamous strength of will couldn't cope with that conversation."

Before following Qui-Gon, Obi-Wan put on the kettle, and took the opportunity for a private comm to Master Ibbith, the healer who normally had the daunting task of dealing with his master.

"Kenobi," the man acknowledged. It was not a good sign when the healers knew a padawan by sight. "Nothing bleeding at this precise moment, I trust?"

"No, Master Ibbith. I was wondering if you could schedule in my master to see you tomorrow. He needs to have his sight adjusted again."

The healer frowned, but forbore from further comment as he checked various listings. "Two of our droids are off for maintenance, but the workload is quite light at the moment, so I see no difficulties fitting him in."

"Would a general body checkup be possible at the same time?"

Ibbith shot a him a sharp look, but after another scan he nodded. "Quite feasible, Apprentice. I'll see him any time in the morning. You'll bring him?"

"Yes, Master." Assuming he was still Qui-Gon's padawan by then. For all Qui-Gon's vaunted strength of mind, Obi-Wan still wasn't convinced of the outcome of the Council meeting.

"And he will be expecting this checkup?"

"A Jedi is trained to deal with the unexpected, Master Ibbith," Obi-Wan replied, wooden-faced.

"On your head be it, Padawan."

Obi-Wan nodded.

"And since you're taking the responsibility for this one, I'll just schedule in a brain scan and two psych tests while I'm at it. Well done, Kenobi: it's not often I get my hands on Master Jinn." Ibbith cleared the connection as if he feared Obi-Wan would reconsider the idea, given any further chance to discuss it. Nor could Obi-Wan blame him, for Qui-Gon's opinions on medical technology were as infamous amongst the healers as was his padawan's frequent need of it. But Obi-Wan was determined this time: Qui-Gon was not going off on another mission without a clean bill of health.

He poured the hot water onto a spoonful of pungent leaves in the old clay teapot, then fiddled with his datapad while he waited for the tea to brew. Qui-Gon's story the night before had piqued his curiosity; he was sure he had come across some reference to a planet in the Lirring sector before, in a context which eluded him but which he just knew bore some relationship to the tale Qui-Gon had told.

Specifying an isolated system with a single satellite was sufficient: the database could only bring up one match. Loading the detailed droid scans, at first Obi-Wan thought it was not the right one. This was indeed a very small planetoid, almost too tiny to maintain an atmosphere. But it was covered in lush vegetation, concealed beneath a heavy cloud layer. There looked to be no bodies of water collected on the surface, just a mass of living, breathing tree-forms exuding vapour into the air. Very unusual, but hardly the place Qui-Gon had described.

Yet it must have been. For Obi-Wan suddenly recognised one of the scans: a larger version of it, painted from the model of this small image, filled one wall in Yoda's rooms. He remembered he had asked Yoda about it one day, but the old master had been unusually abstruse when questioned as to why he had it on display, saying only,

"Made by one strong in the Force, this was."

Obi-Wan had assumed he meant the image of the planet, but now... Eagerly, he pulled up the scanty data available from previous fly-bys. And there, indeed, in a scan dated twenty years before the one on Yoda's wall, was a desolate ball of rock floating through space, bare of all life.

There was no mention of the anomaly in the database. Both scans had been taken by explorer droidships, and the new data had simply been added to the old file without analysis. After all, smugglers and smallholders were constantly terraforming mudballs all over the galaxy; who cared to keep track of settlements which would vanish within a decade?

The same thing had probably happened here, a settlement on a barren rock failing and the colonists heading off once more, taking their livestock with them, leaving the place abandoned. There was no human life there for the second droidship to record; no animal life, either. There were only the trees the settlers must have planted on arrival: that was probably how the plantlife had spread over the entire planet in so short a time, barely decades. In the years to come, the vapour they exuded would form shallow ponds, then lakes...

Obi-Wan thought about a biobubble, left unattended; a handful of Jedi sperm on a rock shattered to fine fragments; the signatures of two powerful Force users; a painting on a wall.

Putting away the datapad, he set about straining the tea into two cups, trying to connect these images with the other things he had learnt the night before.

Qui-Gon had been wrong to worry that Obi-Wan's view of Yoda might be altered by his quiet recitation of an old story. There were a few idiots in the Temple, more outside in the Senate, who saw Yoda as a figure of fun. His size, his ugliness, his speech -- even the primitive stick he used rather than a roboprop -- were all sources of amusement to minds which could not encompass the power of the Force.

But, for all that the idea of a gnome like Yoda fucking a man as physically impressive as Qui-Gon might seem ridiculous, Obi-Wan had always known there was something in Yoda to be feared: something to be hidden from as one hides from the magnificence of a sun going nova. Wondrous, glorious -- but too ruthlessly powerful to be encompassed in human experience.

Obi-Wan loved Yoda deeply. He had no doubt that, both in his own right and as Qui-Gon's padawan, Yoda returned that love to him. And there was no question of Yoda's affection for Qui-Gon. But what was the love of a creature who himself had spanned eight hundred years of time, whose own existence was a living symbol of the power of the Unifying Force? Yoda empathised with them in their sorrows, grieved for them when they died. But he continued beyond them, and for him there would always be another.

No, on reflection it did not surprise Obi-Wan that Yoda could have subjected Qui-Gon to such an extreme ordeal, any more than he would have been surprised by a river cutting a groove through resisting rock, or a baby forcing its way out of its mother's womb. What did surprise him was that Qui-Gon had come so close to the raw essence of Yoda's power, and survived.

The more he considered Qui-Gon's Ritual, the more he saw how clearly it had marked his master. He'd always thought Qui-Gon's constant admonitions to him about his inattention to the Living Force were overblown, or at least stemming from a bias towards the facet of the Force from which much of Qui-Gon's own power originated. But now he realised how careful his master had been to steer him towards balance, even if that meant away from Obi-Wan's own natural reliance on the Unifying Force.

Obi-Wan still hadn't conquered his tendency not to live in the moment; he came nowhere near to rivalling his master's ability to concentrate on the now and the here, tugged as he was toward the then, the next, and the elsewhere. But he would never need so extreme a correction to his equilibrium between the two as Qui-Gon had. Now he understood better why Qui-Gon valued that balance so much, given that it had been achieved with such pain. The line between his brows standing out clearly, Obi-Wan frowned at the thought of what pain his own Ritual might bring when he finally achieved it. Certainly nothing as straightforward as the physical pain he had offered himself up to this morning.

He thought again of a boy, chained to a rock in the middle of nowhere, desperately seeking for the Living Force. He considered how strong that desire must have been. Obi-Wan had once seen his master as too collected and calm to know true passion. Yet now he was forced to consider that Qui-Gon's passion for the Living Force might have been enough to bring about at least one miracle: keeping him alive through Yoda's taking. And perhaps a second, if Yoda's elliptical words had referred to the subject of the painting, rather than the painting itself.

Had all that passion been leached from Qui-Gon by the passing of the years? Suddenly, the glimpses Obi-Wan had had of it last night were not enough. He wanted more.

Still in the robe, two steaming cups in his hands, he went back into the study and placed one on a corner of the desk.

"Tea, Master."

"Hmmm? Thank you..." Qui-Gon made no move to pick it up, immersed in whatever he had found. Glancing over his shoulder, Obi-Wan could see the datapad screen covered in tiny squiggles forming large and small triangles, nesting one within another.

"Old Dahometh?"

"The inscription Master Tobian found carved in barrow tombs on the planet's southern pole. It's older and probably less adulterated than the two paper Folios describing the Ritual; but its meaning is more contentious, since the interpretation can change depending on whether you start at the centre of each trigonal grouping and work outward, or vice versa. The Folios are more linear in form, although they contradict each other."

Obi-Wan squinted at the obscure patterns. "I thought the point was that we all made our own meaning when we undertook the Ritual."

"It's a shame commentators like Horatius have not shown your wisdom, my Padawan." Qui-Gon's tone was dry.

There were notes down half the screen, rough jottings in Qui-Gon's incomprehensible script, even more obscure than the Dahometh. "Do you really understand all that?"

"The Dahometh codices include many interesting philosophical ideas, and some utterly lunatic ones. Yoda had me studying them trying to tell the difference when I was fifteen. Be grateful I have not done the same to you, my Padawan." Qui-Gon tugged on the end of his braid which was trailing over the screen. "Now be quiet so I can work."

'My Padawan' -- it was the second time in as many minutes that Qui-Gon had named him so. Qui-Gon was giving him the words for comfort, but they were more than empty promises. They expressed a truth greater than any to be found in dead scratchings on crumbling rock. He was Qui-Gon's padawan, and that would not, could not change. Obi-Wan allowed the certainty to sink slowly through him, the weighty truth crushing all remaining doubts to leave a clear emptiness behind.

He slipped to the floor beside his master's chair, crossing his feet under his thighs. The mug was a warm weight in his hands, the desk a solid support behind his back as he sat still, letting his thoughts come to rest.

Swept away by those simple words, the fretful worries of the last few days were gone.

In the quietude of their absence, Obi-Wan savoured a clarity of sense and mind he had rarely known. The springy fibres beneath his ankles, the swirling grain of the wood on the arm of Qui-Gon's chair, the faint rustle of cotton as his master shifted, the smoky tannin of the dark liquid between his hands: every sensation was expanded and imbued with the Force, till he could almost reach out to touch the living things these materials all had once been.

With the same lucidity, he knew it made no matter what Qui-Gon found in the documents he was pouring over. Obi-Wan would stay with him: facing the Council, facing the dangers on Malabar, in exile if it came to that. He'd been a fool to even contemplate training with another master. This was where he belonged.

The tea cooled.

He was jolted out of his reverie by Qui-Gon reaching blindly for the cup on the desk.

"No, Master," he said quietly, reaching up to catch at Qui-Gon's sleeve. "It's too cold to drink now. Shall I get you another?"

Qui-Gon muttered something incomprehensible, but his hand slipped to Obi-Wan's shoulder and held him in place when he would have risen, then shifted to ruffle his hair. This time, Obi-Wan stretched into the touch, enjoying the pressure of Qui-Gon's fingertips against his scalp before the hand was withdrawn once more.

Regretfully he felt them go. It would be nice to have those fingers in his hair again -- and on his body too, playing with him as they had last night.

He let his thoughts drift, idly wondering whether Qui-Gon would be willing to bring him to orgasm again. He wouldn't even have to put his mouth on Obi-Wan: those long, enfolding fingers would be enough. Perhaps his master would never have considered the idea if it hadn't been for the circumstances last night. Gods, Obi-Wan had never considered it before last night, either! But now that he'd discovered his master's touch, he found to his surprise that he wasn't willing to give it up.

It seemed ludicrous that they should not give each other pleasure when they couldn't find it elsewhere, as would be the case on Malabar; so Obi-Wan reasoned with himself. Maybe even on the long spaceflight there: what was the point in them each masturbating in their separate bunks when there could be so much more joy to be had, using their hands and mouths on each other?

But Qui-Gon would have to consent to it -- and although Obi-Wan had been so confident demanding a second pleasuring last night, his nerve had deserted him now. He stole a look at his master, sitting with head bowed over the datapad, hair almost brushing the screen. For all that Qui-Gon was so close, the cloth of his leggings rustling against Obi-Wan's arm, his master's distraction with the Dahometh records was not the only thing that stopped Obi-Wan reaching out to him.

Qui-Gon had needed to come last night, but he hadn't woken Obi-Wan up to ask for it.

He winced. Had Qui-Gon thought Obi-Wan would be less generous than his master? Or had he not cared to ask, no matter what answer he expected?

In the end, he'd seemed eager enough, his cock weeping into Obi-Wan's cupped palm as they lay together in the darkness. But any man would have been eager, caught so close to the throes of orgasm and stayed before he could complete the final stroke. Any man, even a Jedi Master, would have moaned for completion then, no matter who had touched him.

Yet it could not be disinterest, for earlier on in the evening Qui-Gon had licked at Obi-Wan's body with relish and a hungry curiosity. Obi-Wan shifted uneasily, putting his own cold tea to one side. That curiosity was not Qui-Gon's alone. For whatever reason the Force had denied Qui-Gon the easing of his need, Obi-Wan was coming to regret the lost opportunity. With the tang of the tea still on his tongue, he admitted to himself that he wanted to know how that big cock tasted.

He'd seen it occasionally, not erect but impressive all the same, when they'd shared bathing facilities or swum together. He'd touched it in the dark, and he'd been reamed by it. But to taste it, to slip the soft foreskin down and tickle the slit with his tongue... And how deeply could he make his master moan the next time? For he had no doubts that Qui-Gon would moan for him, that big body arching up into his mouth...

Obi-Wan almost blushed when he realised he was growing hard. Strange that the image should affect him so strongly, when he hadn't become erect at any point earlier in the morning. Surreptitiously he stretched the robe over his knees to hide the revealing bulge.

How silly; why had he and Qui-Gon never thought of doing this before? He'd been so blind to the concept of Qui-Gon as a lover --

"That's it!"

Obi-Wan jumped in surprise, confused by the sudden interruption to his train of thought. "What's it?"

"The answer. Or at least a better question to set the Council by their heels. You're a wonder, Obi-Wan!"

"You mean..." But Qui-Gon couldn't have possibly followed what he'd been thinking...

"There it is!" Qui-Gon thrust the datapad into Obi-Wan's hands and pointed to a trigonal group on the right of the screen. "If Old Dahometh was anything like Nu Meth Dahometh in grammatical structure, then subject and object were defined by their order in the sentence, rather than by any qualifying suffixes or prefixes."

"Yeesss..." Obi-Wan said dubiously, struggling to interpret the first of the twenty or so symbols grouped in three neat triangles of descending size. His mind had hardly been on alien syntax during the past few minutes.

Qui-Gon was out of his chair now, shoving it back against the wall. "There's been some academic argument that those," he stabbed a finger at a scatter of tiny dots in one corner, "might be the qualifiers, saying who is doing what to whom. It's just as likely that they're purely decorative, since they don't appear in the paper Folios and Nu Meth has nothing like them."

"But hasn't Nu Meth Dahometh had a couple of thousand years to evolve from Old Dahometh? Qualifiers could easily get lost, especially once they started having contact with other cultures," Obi-Wan said, trying to recall what little he had learnt of Dahometh linguistics.

"Exactly the crux of the scholarly debate." Qui-Gon unknotted his sash with impatient fingers and flung it on the chair. "And a better starting point for a contest of pedantry in the Council I have yet to find."

"I'm sorry, Master," Obi-Wan said in bewilderment, watching Qui-Gon haul off his tunic and send it the way of the sash. "You've lost me. Which point do you mean?"

"Why, who penetrates whom, of course."

Obi-Wan's eyes went wide, and wider still as Qui-Gon began to unlace his leggings. "Don't you see, it all depends on the order in which you choose to read the trigons. If you start at the large one and work down, following strict word order the text reads that the Master penetrates the Apprentice."

Qui-Gon's leggings were pooled on the floor now, and, stark naked in the bright sunlight, he was rooting around on the desk. "Where did the wretched thing -- ah!" He seized on the tube of gel Obi-Wan had brought in that morning and twisted off the lid. "But one of the major ambiguities of the stone inscriptions is that they can equally well be read from the inside out. Which would reverse the parsing: the subject would become the object..."

"...and the Apprentice would penetrate the Master?" Obi-Wan hazarded, ogling from his vantage point on the floor as Qui-Gon hefted one foot up on to the top of the desk just beside his head.

"Exactly."

Obi-Wan took a deep breath as he saw Qui-Gon smear gel onto his hand and push one finger unceremoniously inside himself. "You want me to penetrate you?"

"Haven't I just said so?"

He couldn't believe what he was hearing -- nor what he was seeing. No more than a foot away from his face, his master was perched on one leg, bending forward to ply himself open with his one of his own slicked fingers.

Open-mouthed, Obi-Wan let himself gape at the sight, paying no attention as the datapad slid off his lap. He knew the powerful musculature of those thighs and calves almost as well as he knew his own, but he was less well acquainted with the object of his recent ponderings: the long, thin penis resting on the bulge of heavy testicles pushed up to one side by Qui-Gon's hand between his legs.

Pale against the hair-dusted scrotum, it swelled towards the tip, thickening where the foreskin shielded the tender flesh of the head to give a truer indication of the girth Obi-Wan remembered breaching him. The delicate skin was redder there, still slightly sore from the attempt. Liberally sprinkled amongst the darker, coarser thatch on Qui-Gon's groin were fine grey hairs, turning almost to white on the pendulous sac. The pale strands, the muscles developed by decades of effort, the slight thickening around the waist: this was not a young man's body.

It was his master's body, and it was his master's crack just visible as Qui-Gon tilted his pelvis forward to touch deeper inside himself; it was his master's thick knuckle he could see pressing into the tiny opening...

Obi-Wan came fully erect at startling speed.

"You should be able to enter me easily enough -- though your cock isn't that much smaller than mine," Qui-Gon added appraisingly as he worked himself, nodding his chin at the tell-tale swelling between Obi-Wan's crossed legs. "Once we can truthfully say penetration has occurred," he continued, interrupting himself with a grunt of discomfort as he pushed in a second finger, "we mix issues of grammatical pedantry into the argument on substance and form. The Council could debate that for months; meanwhile, we'll be off to Malabar."

Only Qui-Gon could carry on a rational conversation so unconcernedly, while preparing himself to be fucked.

Obi-Wan was still trying to recover from his shock at watching his master do such an intimate thing -- he was a Jedi; surely he could handle the unexpected -- when Qui-Gon finished anointing himself. Qui-Gon pulled out his fingers with another soft grunt and lowered his leg to the ground, then crouched down beside Obi-Wan, thrusting forward the tube.

"Here, use this--"

His voice broke off as he took in Obi-Wan's disconcerted expression.

Obi-Wan watched him visibly catch his breath and reach for calm. Slowly he sat back on his heels, the proffered tube halfway between them.

"Well, Padawan? Will you prepare yourself for me?"

There was a gentleness to the question Obi-Wan had not expected, and a vulnerability that belied Qui-Gon's previous pragmatism.

Obi-Wan took the tube and fiddled with it, averting his eyes from Qui-Gon's flaccid penis. "Master, you don't have to do this."

"What do you mean?"

"I'm the one who has to be penetrated: it's my duty in the Ritual, no matter what arguments we decide to make to the Council. You've already suffered this, years ago. You don't have to suffer it again." He swallowed and looked up at Qui-Gon. "I wouldn't ask that of you."

Qui-Gon's face was warmed by a slow smile. "It won't be on sufferance, Padawan," he said, his voice low. "I fear I'm not as altruistic as you believe: I could manage to enjoy it very well." He trailed his fingers down his apprentice's cheek, touch as ephemeral as the passage of a candle flame, and leaving as searing a heat behind.

This time it was Qui-Gon's own skin touching Obi-Wan, not a microgaunt. And this time it was Qui-Gon's heavy scent on those long fingers. His master had not even paused for a moment to ponder whether he would give himself to Obi-Wan, for all the agonising he had done last night just asking Obi-Wan to masturbate in front of him.

Obi-Wan began to tremble. He reached out for the tube, his fingers not quite steady, cold against Qui-Gon's warmth. Even in his clumsiness it was the work of a moment to pull his robe open and smear the cream over his erection, thick and chill against his swollen penis. It twitched at his touch; Qui-Gon's lips parted at the sight.

Hand shaking with the sudden surge of desire Qui-Gon's response sent through him, Obi-Wan reached up to mirror his master's caress along the bearded line of Qui-Gon's jaw. Sharp bristles smoothed under his stroking fingers. He saw Qui-Gon's eyes close, his nostrils flare as he took in a deep breath, and then Qui-Gon's body begin a fine trembling to match his own.

"Lie down for me," Obi-Wan whispered, enthralled by his handiwork.

"Obi-Wan -- " Qui-Gon's eyes opened again and he looked at Obi-Wan, all dazed confusion.

But that was alright. Obi-Wan could cope from here, now that they had finally broken through to this point.

"Lean back. That's it: all the way, now." Qui-Gon went willingly, his great body felled by the gentlest of strokes down his breastbone. He spread his knees and Obi-Wan slipped between them, hand continuing to roam on Qui-Gon's bare chest and stomach. Beneath the smooth skin Obi-Wan's fingertips sensed the firm resistance of heavy pectoral muscles, then the soft yielding of the tender flesh of Qui-Gon's belly.

He heard Qui-Gon moan. It was as deep a sound as Obi-Wan had just been hoping to bring forth from him.

His hand brushed over the head of the soft cock lying nestled below and he bent down, dropping a gentle kiss on the delicate skin. It stirred under his lips, but regretfully he left it, contenting himself with a single dart of his tongue against the patch of red which his own body had marked on Qui-Gon a few hours previously.

Even if the involuntary upward movement of Qui-Gon's hips to follow his retreating mouth could be construed as permission, this wasn't the time to claim the treat he'd not been offered the night before. This was the time to complete the Ritual, and here, at the last, their fate was in Obi-Wan's hands.

Sitting back on his heels he slipped the robe from his shoulders, feeling the sunlight fall warm upon his bared back as he folded it into a neat bundle. Qui-Gon's eyes followed the movement, his head bent forward awkwardly to hold Obi-Wan in view.

"Keep your head up," Obi-Wan said, leaning forward to tuck the bundle of cloth under his master's head. "I don't want to pull your hair."

Their bodies couldn't help but brush against each other as Obi-Wan stretched over his master to place the robe beneath his raised head, nipple sliding against nipple. With a sigh, Qui-Gon relaxed back against the improvised pillow. And, so close to those slightly-opened lips, Obi-Wan could not resist. He pressed his mouth against Qui-Gon's, felt his master start in surprise then yield beneath him. Force, the man was sweet, breath warm against his cheek as Obi-Wan plundered the willing, open mouth.

If Obi-Wan was taking, Qui-Gon was giving, his arms reaching up to wrap themselves round his padawan's body as his legs cradled Obi-Wan between them. Small sounds came from his throat, muffled by Obi-Wan's tongue winding against his; his fingers slid along Obi-Wan's ribs in eager exploration. Between Qui-Gon's thighs, Obi-Wan felt something stirring, protruding. His master was getting hard.

Obi-Wan released his mouth, nuzzling into the short beard despite the sound of protest which followed him. His movement tipped Qui-Gon's head back, arched his chest up. "I'll kiss you again soon," Obi-Wan promised against the swell of Qui-Gon's throat, his mouth trying to capture the vibrations of Qui-Gon's moaned dissent. "But let me in first."

Qui-Gon's breath caught as Obi-Wan slid a little down his body and nudged his thighs further apart. "Yes, Obi-Wan," he urged, his shoulders slumping back to the rug and his pelvis tilting up in an undulation that brought a groan from Obi-Wan's own mouth. "Do it, do it now--" He broke off with a low cry as Obi-Wan pushed into him.

Gazing down at Qui-Gon's face, caught in a rictus of tension, Obi-Wan shuddered at the tightness he had just breached. Qui-Gon's groin was pushing up to meet him, but his anus was still slightly resistant, not yet as generous as the rest of his body despite the gel easing the way.

But Qui-Gon gave himself no leeway. "Oh, more, Obi-Wan." His knees rocked up to Obi-Wan's shoulders.

Bracing himself on his elbows, Obi-Wan pushed deeper, forcing Qui-Gon's head back again. "Like that, my Master?" he whispered, his voice almost lost in the panting breaths from the man underneath him.

"Yes, yes," Qui-Gon answered him eagerly, wrapping his legs around Obi-Wan's waist. "Kiss me too..."

He tangled his fingers in his master's hair till the big body curved up enough for their mouths to meet again, Qui-Gon's hands finding purchase on his shoulders. They rocked together, Obi-Wan mesmerised by the heat of the two orifices he was penetrating. Smooth thrusts, deep into his master's anus and mouth, and oh, this felt so good, so right, and he couldn't believe he'd never entered this close, warm channel until now, never felt Qui-Gon moving so vital and alive beneath him, never rubbed tongue against tongue. It all seemed so natural, so familiar.

And yet there was much in it that was new. The scratch of Qui-Gon's moustache across his upper lip: he hadn't made love to a bearded man before. The sensation of being half-surrounded by such a large body. Qui-Gon's own ardour -- when, before today, had he ever imagined his master inflamed with passion? For there was no mistaking the rigid cock pressing into his stomach, or the desperate sounds Qui-Gon was making in the back of his throat, to be swallowed into Obi-Wan's mouth. His master's excitement was infectious, yet at the same time too fast, too urgent, as if all the pent-up lust from last night had overtaken him at once.

But this was Obi-Wan's Ritual, and their lovemaking was his to lead, not Qui-Gon's. Others might lie beneath their masters in passive submission, but not Qui-Gon's apprentices.

There was duty, too, to be considered.

Unwillingly Obi-Wan pulled back from their kiss, pushing Qui-Gon down when his master rose up on one elbow to follow him. The big man groaned and fell back to the makeshift pillow, moaning even more when Obi-Wan slowed the pace of his thrusts. "Obi-Wan!" Qui-Gon's face was bright red. "Don't stop! I'm going to come," and his own hand frantically sought his penis to pull on it.

Obi-Wan mercilessly closed his grip around Qui-Gon's wrist and dragged it away in a repetition of the previous night. "No, you're not," he said grimly, hanging on to his own control by just a thread. Pinning Qui-Gon's wrist to the rug, he reached down to close his fingers round the base of Qui-Gon's cock, squeezing hard enough to prevent the older man from climaxing.

"No!"

He ignored Qui-Gon's protest, keeping his grip tight until he was sure his master had come back from the brink and Qui-Gon's body had relaxed a little around his penis. Then he let go to balance himself between his master's thighs once more, catching his breath at the sight of Qui-Gon's cock. It rose purple-headed between them, puissant and inflamed. Obi-Wan spoke to Qui-Gon, but his words were meant as warning to the rod of flesh as much as to the man. "You're not to come yet, you understand me? You're a Jedi Master -- you can manage to control yourself for a while longer."

When Qui-Gon failed to answer, he challenged, "Well? Can't you?"

Qui-Gon hid his face with his hands, but not before Obi-Wan had seen the upset there. He couldn't remember Qui-Gon ever seeming so vulnerable before. His own frustration subsided a little.

"Ah, no, Master," he said, more kindly now. "Don't be ashamed. I didn't mean to taunt you. And I won't do this if it leads to shame between us." He stroked his hand over Qui-Gon's belly. "But you mustn't fear your own desire, Qui-Gon. If you want me, show me. Let me see."

He continued the gentle caress, tantalising and soothing at the same time, feeling muscles twitch beneath his touch until finally Qui-Gon lowered his hands. The desperate need in his face set Obi-Wan quivering. There was no control left in those burning blue eyes, only a hunger so devouring it could consume Obi-Wan if he let it. Yet Obi-Wan was not afraid.

"I didn't know until last night." Qui-Gon's voice was rough, raw. "Please, Obi-Wan, you must believe me." His fingers came to dig themselves into the soft inner flesh of Obi-Wan's arms. "I would never take advantage--"

"You should have," Obi-Wan interrupted. He kissed Qui-Gon softly till his master's hands relaxed again. "It would have been easier for us both." It was a light admonishment, made harsher by the long slow thrust accompanying it, that had his master's body clutching at him once more. "If you'd shown me you wanted me last night, I think I might have been allowed to let you come then. But you couldn't get up the nerve to ask me for it, could you? You had to remain silent, even after I'd come begging to you twice." He dragged in a calming breath, trying to centre himself before he thrust again, seeing the tendons cord on Qui-Gon's neck as he did so.

"I was a coward," Qui-Gon whispered. "I'd failed to consider I could want you, and then to find I did so badly -- it shook me. I couldn't have borne it if you said no." He touched a finger to Obi-Wan's lips. "It hurt enough when you said you weren't allowed to. But if you had said you didn't want to..." He hid his face again, against Obi-Wan's arm, and this time Obi-Wan let him.

"I've been no better," Obi-Wan confessed, stroking Qui-Gon's hair. It was soft beneath his fingers, half-freed from its tie. "If you were a coward, I was an idiot. I didn't even realise what I wanted until just now." Obi-Wan shuddered, remembering the blindness that would have demanded Qui-Gon's complicity in a forced taking. "I think we've paid the price today for our cowardice and stupidity."

Qui-Gon leaned back into his caress. "Fools and cowards both," he agreed, smiling up at his padawan with a new lightheartedness in his eyes. But when Obi-Wan began to push in again, he must have nudged Qui-Gon's prostate, because Qui-Gon gasped and all amusement died from him, his mouth falling open with gaping need. Obi-Wan stared, astounded at the sight: Qui-Gon in lust. This was his own dear master, but to see this face on him... To have Qui-Gon let him see...

He leaned into the thrust to kiss Qui-Gon's mouth once more, this time deep and sweet till they were both shivering. Kiss, and thrust, and trying to hold Qui-Gon's quickly-mounting passion in check while his own body reached readiness -- almost impossible, for every push in took Qui-Gon spiralling beyond him, moaning and wrapping his legs even tighter round Obi-Wan's waist.

After a few moments, Obi-Wan collapsed back down on Qui-Gon's chest. "This isn't going to work, you know." His words were muffled against Qui-Gon's warm, sweaty skin as he lay there, terribly aware of the hard length pressing into his stomach.

"You're right." Qui-Gon gave a ragged sigh. "I don't suppose, since I can't control myself, you'd just fuck me into the carpet, would you?"

Obi-Wan couldn't stifle his laughter. "What a request, and from my own Master. It's going to take something like that to make me come, after you wasted me last night." And how good it was, to lie here joking with his cock buried in this man, even with Qui-Gon's need a thrum of dissatisfaction beneath him and his master muttering under his breath about the inadequate stamina of youth.

"There's an order we have to do this in -- it is a Ritual, after all," Obi-Wan reproved gently. "At this rate you'll be coming long before me."

"I don't see what's wrong with that," Qui-Gon groused.

Obi-Wan smiled into the slick skin beneath him. "This is my Ritual and we're doing it my way." Qui-Gon's grumbling eased as Obi-Wan gave him a sharp prod with his cock before sitting back upright. "Pass me your hair-tie. It might do."

For all the complaints, his master was swift to pull the leather tie out, dropping it into Obi-Wan's outstretched hand. He watched with stoic resignation as Obi-Wan brushed away the curling pubic hairs and fastened the thin strip around the base of Qui-Gon's penis, tightly enough to constrict some of the flow of blood or semen. All the time, Obi-Wan's cock was snug inside him.

Obi-Wan finished the tie with a knot. "You can consider this the revenge of the Force for that sin of cowardice. After all, it has to punish you more, since you're the older and ought to have known better."

"The Force doesn't take revenge," Qui-Gon remonstrated, his hands clenched on Obi-Wan's arms as his padawan drove home into him.

"Oh, no?" Obi-Wan gave a breathless laugh. "Say that after I've fucked you into the carpet, as requested. Now remember, don't come!"

And he began to pick up the tempo, eager now to reach his own climax. Each thrust was faster than the one before, quick and hard, Qui-Gon's body finally open enough to allow him swift passage. Obi-Wan had thought Qui-Gon would lie patiently under him, but instead his master met the furious pace, looping his legs up over Obi-Wan's shoulders to let Obi-Wan drive deeper yet. His short gasps were a counterpoint to Obi-Wan's urgent lunges as he bore his padawan's weight on his doubled thighs, tilting his pelvis up into every stroke, his calves heavy on Obi-Wan's back, his balls rubbing against the swell of Obi-Wan's stomach.

"Need more," Obi-Wan panted, then he bit his lip between his teeth, drawing back to the entrance to Qui-Gon's body. Now each stroke was short, shallow, jabbing into the tightness of Qui-Gon's anus only to pull back again as fast as he could. His foreskin rubbed against the portal, making his master moan under him.

But Obi-Wan was too far gone to worry about pushing Qui-Gon to climax. "Oh gods, Master, touch me -- please!" he begged, his hips jerking faster against the delicious friction of Qui-Gon's body. He groaned as Qui-Gon responded immediately, snaking a hand between them to send his fingernails raking down the tender protrusion of Obi-Wan's nipples.

"Yes, my Padawan, my Obi-Wan. Come now," his master's voice urged him, with an unaccustomed quaver.

Obi-Wan felt the tightening and rising of his balls at last. He made one final, deep thrust, surprising a cry out of Qui-Gon, and then came, his own cry echoing in the room. Qui-Gon called out again as he received Obi-Wan's hot seed into his body -- or perhaps it was the weight of his padawan collapsing down on him, careless in rapture, that triggered the shout. Obi-Wan couldn't tell; he was utterly caught up in the spasms of pleasure racking him. His cock pulsed weakly, giving up the last of his ejaculate to the sound of his low groans.

He came back to himself as Qui-Gon sighed beneath him. The last lunge had buried him deep in his master, and his stirring mind noted the pressure surrounding his slowly subsiding erection, as well as the damp warmth of Qui-Gon's sac pressed below his stomach, the soft hairs curling to tickle his skin. Scrabbling for coherent thought, he was relieved to find that Qui-Gon's penis was still hard against him. Either Qui-Gon's control or the tie had served them well; he suspected the latter. Slowly he eased himself off his master's thighs, pausing for a tiny kiss to the tender skin just inside Qui-Gon's knee.

Qui-Gon moaned, a sound as soft as the wind soughing through branches, and moaned again as Obi-Wan withdrew from his body, lowering his abused legs to the thick pile of the rug. He lay there, eyes closed but face naked to Obi-Wan, and his hands were clenched by his side. "A moment now, my Master," Obi-Wan whispered, fingernails pulling the knot in the tie free. Qui-Gon acknowledged the promise with a small shifting of his hips, but no more, as if he were absorbed in some other sensation which made him oblivious to Obi-Wan's movements, while his padawan slipped from between his legs to straddle him.

But his eyes shot open when Obi-Wan lowered himself down onto Qui-Gon's penis.

It glided into Obi-Wan's body, even and sure. The gel he'd anointed himself with after his shower that morning eased the way, but even without it Obi-Wan was certain Qui-Gon's prick would have slipped in, a blade finding the sheath which had moulded to its shape over the passage of years. He didn't hesitate, just let himself slide down over Qui-Gon's cock to envelop it.

Qui-Gon gasped, reaching out too late to slow his descending padawan. Obi-Wan laughed and caught his hands, using them to steady himself for the final few inches. There was pressure, yet only enough for him to feel filled, replete. It was the same snugness as Qui-Gon's arms around him, cradling him, but taken deep within. He had adjusted perfectly to match the great length inside.

His master's cock in his body.

Sighing, he settled himself down while his master watched with wide, apprehensive eyes.

"It's alright," he murmured. "It fits, now."

Qui-Gon gave a disbelieving huff, half laugh and half worry. "You're sure?" His fingers squeezed tight, as if the pain he imagined for his padawan were his own.

"I'm sure." Obi-Wan brought one of those tensed hands up to kiss it, savouring the slight stretch the movement caused. He was perfectly balanced: at the very edge of fullness before his body could find discomfort, yet close enough to titillate himself -- or Qui-Gon -- with the smallest effort. Hiding a smile in Qui-Gon's palm, he squeezed, ever so slightly.

"Obi-Wan!" His master's shocked expression made him laugh out loud, and he did it again, stronger this time, relishing Qui-Gon's involuntary thrust into the constriction.

"Good?" he asked breathlessly, his teeth gleaming in a triumphant grin.

"Very good." Qui-Gon smiled back, slow and joyous.

"Shall I ride you, my Master?" He brushed his lips over Qui-Gon's knuckles. "Or would I be too slow for you? You can roll me over, if you like."

"Are you sure you're ready for this? I can wait a moment..." Qui-Gon freed his hand to brush tentatively at the point where their bodies joined, his finger caressing the tie of flesh that now encircled the root of his penis. Obi-Wan quivered at the touch against this most sensitive place, made more tender for being stretched around Qui-Gon's girth.

"No need to wait, Qui-Gon," he said, very earnest. "I'm ready for you now."

"Then ride me," Qui-Gon responded huskily, slipping his hand up to fondle Obi-Wan's balls. "Please. I'm not sure I can last out for you--"

"You don't have to," Obi-Wan interrupted. "It's time I pleasured you for a change. Just lie back and enjoy."

He captured Qui-Gon's hands again, brought them upright till they were braced elbow to floor, and then curled his fingers into his master's. It was just enough to give him the leverage he needed for his first rise and fall. Slow, this one, yet Qui-Gon moaned deep in his throat and his eyelids fluttered shut. Obi-Wan watched his throat work as he swallowed. No, Qui-Gon wouldn't last long.

Obi-Wan did it once more, slow still, savouring the slide of that soft-skinned cock against the secret places within him. Its rub over his prostate sent a wave of warmth through him: not the sharp lust which had consumed him before, but a sweet pleasure at the intimacy of having Qui-Gon touch him so deep.

"Now to it, my Master," he whispered, and began to move faster on Qui-Gon's body. Qui-Gon responded to the command, pulling up his knees to let him push into Obi-Wan's descents. Obi-Wan watched him avidly, charting the flush rising up his chest, the tendons straining in his neck, the deep breaths followed by grunts of release as Obi-Wan bore down to cover him. Sweaty, lined face crimson with his impending climax, he was anything but elegant, anything but beautiful.

And Obi-Wan loved him.

Perhaps at some level he always had, but now it rose up to greet him, a wave as relentless as the orgasm that had finally swept Qui-Gon to its crest. Obi-Wan watched helplessly as his master was tossed to the peak and then thrown under, his mouth wide to gasp for air as his last breath became a cry. Beautiful, even in the ugliness of ecstasy, and Obi-Wan loved him with all his heart.

The heat of Qui-Gon's seed rushing into his body made Obi-Wan blink, dislodging a tear. Trembling, he wiped it away, then lowered himself to lie cradled on Qui-Gon's still heaving chest. Just as Qui-Gon's wilting cock slipped free of Obi-Wan's body, his arms came up to enfold his padawan. But they were no longer the safe beachhead they once had been, for Qui-Gon had been swept away by the same swell as had taken him, and they were both lost.

They lay there, flotsam abandoned by the tide, for some time.

It was Obi-Wan who stirred at last, sitting up when Qui-Gon started to shiver underneath him. The sun had passed beyond the window, leaving the room in shadow.

"Master?" he whispered. "You're getting cold. You should dress."

"I can't move." Qui-Gon gave a slow smile, opening his eyes, as he repeated Obi-Wan's claim from the night before. "Let me stay here, or take me to my bed. I don't mind."

His words came sluggishly, yet there was so much unburdened joy in his regard that Obi-Wan caught his breath and leant down, intending to kiss Qui-Gon once more. But another shiver, visible to the eye this time, stopped him.

"Come on. To bed -- we're not staying here." Obi-Wan got to his knees beside Qui-Gon, his own flesh goosepimpling. "Put your arms around my neck and I'll carry you."

"Always ambitious, my Padawan," Qui-Gon answered. Nevertheless, he put an arm around Obi-Wan's shoulders and suffered himself to be lifted, Obi-Wan picking him up with one arm under his knees and another behind his long back. It was an awkward position: even ignoring Qui-Gon's greater weight, his height alone made it an impossible task without the Force to assist. But they were used to managing it. Qui-Gon tucked his head into the curve of Obi-Wan's neck as he was carried through the salon, lying quiet in his padawan's safe hold. His face was hot against Obi-Wan's skin, and his breathing had grown deep and slow, as if he were slipping into sleep.

Manoeuvring his burden with ease through the doorways, Obi-Wan had a sudden memory of learning to do this. It had been after the mission to Flt'hyne, when Qui-Gon had shattered his kneecap with a small army in pursuit of them both, and Obi-Wan, no more than fifteen and not big for his age, had been incapable of lifting him. He had had to drag Qui-Gon on a rough litter for miles, wincing at every smothered gasp of pain. The day they finally returned to Temple, Obi-Wan had requisitioned a scrap droid body roughly Qui-Gon's weight and height, and started to practice levitation.

He must have been a sight, brows knit, struggling to pick up the awkward load a good foot taller than himself. "It will come, Obi-Wan," Qui-Gon had remonstrated with amusement from his floatseat, his knee still immobilised under bacta pads. "No need to push yourself so hard. Why not try starting with your boot? Size makes no difference, but you might find a smaller object less mentally daunting."

"I don't want to move a smaller object," Obi-Wan had stubbornly replied. "This is what I need to carry: I don't care about anything else."

And Qui-Gon had smiled, humour laced with sympathy for the ordeal which was fuelling Obi-Wan's determination, and had left him in peace.

Now, laying a drowsing Qui-Gon down on the crumpled sheets, Obi-Wan reflected that the hard-learnt skill had served him well: he'd carried Qui-Gon too many times since. But not to Qui-Gon's own bed, and never naked. Snatching the coverlet from where he had left it tumbled on the floor, Obi-Wan pulled it over the nude, shivering figure, increasingly concerned. It had been cool in the study, but not enough to cause this reaction in his master.

"Qui-Gon?" he asked softly, hitching the cover over one bare shoulder. "Do you want to sleep?"

He took the opportunity to check Qui-Gon's temperature under the pretence of sweeping sweat-sticky hair from his forehead, the tie having been abandoned with all their clothes in the study. The skin, indeed, was unnaturally hot, and Qui-Gon was slow to answer, roused from his inertia. But when he did, he gave Obi-Wan a knowing look from overbright eyes; his padawan had obviously failed to fool him. "It's a fever, but it will be gone soon."

"I'll get Master Ibbith." Where a day ago he would have wasted time coaxing Qui-Gon into the healer's visit, Obi-Wan had no tolerance for such subtleties now. He would have been out the door, but Qui-Gon caught his wrist and pulled him off balance to sit on the bed.

"There's nothing Ibbith can do. A few hours' sleep and it will pass." He captured his padawan's swinging braid and gave it a tug. "Don't fret, Obi-Wan."

"How do you know?" Obi-Wan challenged, laying the back of his hand against Qui-Gon's throat openly this time. The skin there was even hotter, but it was the suddenness of the fever which really concerned him. "This isn't some evil disease you've brought home from visiting the initiates, is it?" he added, the awful suspicion just dawning. Last time it had been ribbipox.

His master laughed, a full-bodied laugh suffused with wickedness and happiness together. "I caught it from you, Padawan mine."

"But I haven't got any--" His words stumbled to a halt as realisation hit.

"Should I react any less to you than I did to Yoda?" Qui-Gon said gently, but with great satisfaction. He reached up to brush his fingers along Obi-Wan's cheekbone, the other hand still tethering him by his braid.

"You mean it's my..." he swallowed, overpowered by the thought. "It's my semen in you."

Qui-Gon nodded, his face solemn.

"Mine." His hand dropped to Qui-Gon's abdomen, the coverlet separating flesh from flesh. His eyes were wide with wonder. "You're feverish for me."

"Incurably," Qui-Gon said, the wickedness returning, and suddenly Obi-Wan was conscious of his own nudity as he perched there, in those familiar surroundings, wearing not a stitch and with Qui-Gon's own semen slowly leaking out of him onto the coverlet. His master's gaze raked over his body again as if he appreciated the sight, but there was more than lust or fever in that look. It was the love which combined with them to leave Obi-Wan shaking inside, overwhelmed by the depth of his response. It was too much to take in, too confusing--

He curbed his own emotions ruthlessly. There were practical matters to be attended to, before he could concentrate on the implications of this bouleversement. In a voice as calm as he could manage, he said, "It took days for you to get better last time. Should I contact the Council to delay the mission?"

"No need." Qui-Gon rested his hand over Obi-Wan's. "My control over the Unifying Force is somewhat better than it was then. Let me sleep in peace for a couple of hours. I'm sure you could use the time well yourself." He tugged on Obi-Wan's braid again.

"I could," Obi-Wan admitted with reluctance. "The Ritual is complete, but there are truths in it still whispering...I can only just glimpse them. A few hours to think on them would be welcome." He gave a shuddering sigh. Those truths were unlikely to be wholly pleasant; otherwise, the Ritual would not have been named one of Acquiescence. "Are you sure you want me to leave you?"

"I'll recover faster without you near."

Qui-Gon must have noted Obi-Wan's quick hurt, as quickly concealed, for he went on, "You don't think Yoda stayed by my bunk to speed me better, do you? He was making sure the infection took; making it worse, if anything. The closer you are to me, the more I'll react, until I have this under control."

"Oh." Obi-Wan had not quite understood that. "So this is only a kind of --" he searched for the idea "-- of vaccine, then."

Qui-Gon stopped toying with his braid, and curled it tightly round his fist instead. "Obi-Wan," he said, and all the teasing lightheartedness had gone, though the fever burned brighter in him yet. "You must know how much more it is than that to me. I want you. I crave you."

Obi-Wan sat speechless, stunned by such an open declaration, but Qui-Gon did not wait for his response. "If I were free from duties and missions, I'd ask you to take me again, now, even if I were to burst into flame from the heat of your seed inside me." He caught his breath for a moment, and rocked his hips on the bed, as if the semen still there were burning him deep. His voice was shaking when he spoke again. "I love you, my Padawan, in more ways than I ever thought. There is no time for me to show you how much -- never any time!" and he tossed his head fretfully on the pillow. "But I love you in this moment, beyond all moments. You must know..."

"Hush, Qui-Gon. Calm yourself." Obi-Wan wiped the sweat from his master's brow again, only to have the older man shudder under his touch. "I should go. I'm making you worse, aren't I?"

"It won't last." Qui-Gon sank back into the pillows, his lashes dark against his flushed cheeks. He let Obi-Wan's braid fall from his grasp. "Be over soon."

"The sooner if you sleep." Obi-Wan tucked the coverlet over his master's shoulders once more. "I'll leave you now. Call if you need anything -- anything at all."

"One thing. Kiss me."

It was a hoarse, sleep-rasped command, and Qui-Gon was already dropping into slumber, but Obi-Wan bent to him anyway, brushing his mouth against Qui-Gon's hot, dry lips. They opened beneath him and he deepened the kiss, even knowing he should not, pressing his tongue into Qui-Gon's mouth and hearing his master moan.

When they finally parted, Qui-Gon was shuddering helplessly beneath him. "Go," he said, his voice barely audible.

"I'll be in the sunroom if you need me. Just call -- I'll hear." Reluctantly Obi-Wan stood and backed to the door, then stopped. It was with relief that he heard Qui-Gon's breathing easing already, slowing and deepening as he drifted off.

"Sleep well, my love," Obi-Wan whispered, and closed the door behind him.

Obi-Wan didn't measure time by the beating of living hearts: he measured it by the slow compression of matter into planets, counting out the seconds as micron-thin layers of dust adhering to rock. It was three hours -- twelve ko -- before Qui-Gon slipped open the door to the balcony and came to settle down opposite him, stirring him from his meditation.

Wrapped in a cloak despite the heat of the sun, he had been kneeling on a cushion, facing out to the bustle of life which was Coruscant at mid-day. Qui-Gon chose to sit on the ground, crossing his long legs as he leant back against the railing to face his padawan, his leggings a thin protection against the rough surface beneath him. He'd tidied his hair and slipped on his tunics, but he wore nothing warmer. Obi-Wan saw that the shivering appeared to have gone as quickly as it had come, although Qui-Gon was a little paler than usual.

"You're feeling better now?"

Qui-Gon nodded. "And you, my Padawan? Have you found the truths you were seeking?" He reached out and traced the track of a tear down Obi-Wan's cheek with tender fingertips. "It looks to have been a hard search."

"Harder than I'd thought." He hadn't realised he'd wept, but the skin underneath his eyes was stiff with salt.

Qui-Gon sighed and let his hand drop. "For some Jedi -- strong Jedi, good people -- this Ritual means nothing. They drop their leggings, open their arses, and in half an hour it is all over. Or so I've heard them say. I wish it had been the same for you, Obi-Wan."

"With you for a Master and Yoda for a Grand-Master, I suppose I was doomed."

"You make your own fate," Qui-Gon replied, a bit sharply.

He studied Obi-Wan's face when Obi-Wan flinched at the words. "Will you tell me? You don't have to, but perhaps I can help ease your pain."

"It doesn't hurt anymore." Obi-Wan sniffed and wiped his face on the corner of his robe. "Oh, that's not altogether true, and I suppose it will hurt from time to time, but I have made my choice, Master. The hardest part was understanding that there was a choice at all."

"Between being a Jedi," Qui-Gon probed cautiously, "or being something else?"

Obi-Wan smiled, a feeble effort. "No, that was Xan's question, not mine. If they denied me my knighthood and exiled me for years on a desert rock, I'd still be a Jedi. The question is, what kind of a Jedi? The one I wanted to be -- or the one the Force needs me to be?"

"Tell me what you wanted." Qui-Gon folded his hands into the sleeves of his outer tunic.

Obi-Wan brushed away a fallen thread from the band tying his braid. "A child's dream."

"A man's desire. Tell me."

This time Obi-Wan's smile was more genuine. "Do you know how famous you are, Qui-Gon Jinn?"

Surprise flitted across Qui-Gon's face. "Infamous, more like. A master who's lost two padawans, a renegade to the Council and a troublemaker for the Senate. At least, that's how the story went, last time I listened."

Obi-Wan had heard a different version. "The greatest warrior of our age, most notable of all Yoda's many apprentices, hero of a thousand adventures, Master by the time you were thirty. Every padawan in this building knows your name -- yes," when Qui-Gon would have interrupted, "and every Temple in the Order would be honoured to have you visit. They might be scared stiff of what you'd get up to while you were there, but that's another matter."

Qui-Gon shook his head in disavowal, but Obi-Wan knew he was not so naive as to be unaware of his own reputation. He'd used it often enough in missions to pave the way or cower the opposition. "Are you treating my notoriety, then, as a standard you feel you have to live up to? I've never told you to strive for fame, Obi-Wan."

"No. But I want it." He didn't quite look at Qui-Gon as he made this confession. He was ashamed of what he was going to say; but, more than that, he knew it to be only part of the truth, and not the greater part, either. He could only hope that nis notoriously perceptive master would accept it as the whole, and not look any further.

"I've always dreamed of fame," he said, "since I was an initiate, from the creche even. It was one of the reasons that I first longed to be your padawan, rather than Master Mace's, or Master Gallia's. Even Master Yoda wouldn't have done: there's not much glory in being small and green, after all."

Qui-Gon dutifully laughed at that, but his eyes were serious as he watched Obi-Wan. "So there's glory in fighting? In being a warrior?"

Obi-Wan shook his head dismissively. "I thought so when I was seven, yes. I have grown up a bit since then. Anyway, glory is wonderful for the day you earn it, and the week you enjoy it, but it doesn't live on. I wanted fame." He couldn't hide the hunger in his voice, the old longing that hadn't yet been fully tamped down.

"The opinions of others has always mattered so much to you, Obi-Wan. Too much, perhaps."

"Oh, I don't want to be famous to them," Obi-Wan gestured at the aircars whizzing silently past through the traffic lanes, and the tall buildings thronged with life forms from all over the galaxy. "I want to be sure of my place in the Temple, but I don't care whether or not other knights whisper and point me out in the hallways the way they do you. It's not the now that I care about."

"What, then?"

"It's the future. I dreamed of doing something -- some one thing -- that would let my name be remembered for the next five hundred years. Something that initiates would learn about, or that scholars would study. I don't want to be a stranger to our descendents, Master."

He sighed and looked up at the satellites overhead, bright enough to wink down on the planet even through the noonday sunshine. "The universe is so huge. Don't you feel it when you touch the Unifying Force? Such expanses of time and space, yet all ordered, all held in structures. It's the void beyond which frightens me, Master. I don't want to be condemned to the void. I want my existence to be marked, clear to see, even when I've died."

"So joining the Force at the last isn't enough for you?" Qui-Gon leant over to pluck another errant thread from Obi-Wan's braid tie, holding it up to the light to see it more clearly. "You want to conquer time. No mean feat, my Padawan, even for a great Jedi."

Obi-Wan hung his head. "That's part of the submission the Force is asking me to give: that I never become great in my own right. If I follow where it leads, I will always be the other one, the footnote padawan to a famous master, maybe even one day the footnote master to a great padawan -- but never marked as important in my own right. Just as you're the one they talk about now, Qui-Gon, they'll be telling the stories about someone else when they bother to mention me. And the worst of it is that it is a choice. I could have the undying name I was seeking, if I wanted."

"So sure are you?" Qui-Gon asked Yoda's favoured question, quietly, gently, peering at the thread he held between his fingers.

"I think so." Obi-Wan gave a shuddering sigh. "Always in motion the future is, and I've had very few sureties in my life, very few things I would swear were bound to happen, or had happened just so. Perhaps that's why I look outside for the black and white, as you call them, rather than trying to determine them for myself. But I always knew I was meant to be a Jedi. And I know I could be one of the most famous of all the Jedi, if I chose."

His voice dropped. "Or I could choose to go with you."

Qui-Gon grew very still. "So I'm the one who precludes you from greatness, then?"

"I fear so, my Master."

"Why do you think this?" Qui-Gon's voice was sharply accusatory as he let the thread fall from his fingers unregarded, swivelling to face his padawan. "Just because I am famous now, I see no reason for you to live in my shadow all your days. Have you had a vision? Or is this just another one of those feelings of yours?" His eyes blazed down on Obi-Wan.

Obi-Wan drew up his knees and wrapped his arms round them, staring unseeing at his feet. "I didn't need a vision. It's there in the structures of the Ritual, if you care to look. Can't you see it, Qui-Gon?"

"No, I cannot." Qui-Gon's anger tainted the air between them. "Explain what you mean."

Obi-Wan chose his words slowly, aware of how much Qui-Gon loathed theoretical arguments. "The Ritual -- all rituals -- are a focus of the Unifying Force, for they span time and space, transcending both just as the Unifying Force does. They link ancestors to their descendents: endless mirrors in one long sequence. When Yoda cut off your braid, you knew he had performed that same action for nineteen padawans before you. You knew his master had performed it for him. You were all connected for that one moment in time, that shared experience."

"We are individuals," Qui-Gon retorted. "We come to a ritual with our own presuppositions, our own beliefs and personalities. We might share the surface actions, but we warp each ritual to fit our interior selves."

"Yes, each mirror distorts a little," Obi-Wan argued back. "The ritual might even be changed in small degrees, until finally it means something completely different, or nothing at all. But nevertheless, if you trace it through the people who've performed it, you can see the links joining them."

Obi-Wan glanced up at Qui-Gon's stern face. "I think the Jedi took this ritual from Dahometh because it's so powerfully linked to the Unifying Force that it can mirror the future, as well as the past. And perhaps it comes to you and me more purely, because it was Yoda himself who handed it on to us. You, me, Xanatos: for all of us it was more than just baring our arses."

"Master to apprentice." Qui-Gon sighed, the fierce gaze attenuating. He rubbed the bridge of his nose, fingering the place where it had been broken.

"You can see how your life has echoed what happened in your Ritual, can't you?" Obi-Wan asked, palm up in an imploring gesture. "You gave your submission to the Unifying Force, and it marked you apart from the others. Rituals should bind the participants into a community; but with you, it was the opposite. You should have done it in Temple, but you went to the furthest reaches of the galaxy. Instead of returning to your yearmates afterwards, you went into isolation on Dagobah for months. And when you came back..."

"I didn't really fit in any more. They didn't know what to do with a padawan who wasn't twenty yet, but wouldn't defer to his masters in his interpretation of the Force." Qui-Gon said it without bitterness, but Yoda had told Obi-Wan about the battles which had raged on the Council, as to whether a wild card like Padawan Jinn ought to be allowed to attempt the Trials at all.

"Isn't it true to say you didn't care whether you fitted in or not?"

"Fitting in doesn't matter," Qui-Gon said, his hand slashing dismissively through the air.

"It does to me," Obi-Wan replied quietly, his chin set. "I want my place in the structures of the Temple. I'm happy in them. But I know you don't understand that."

Qui-Gon looked about to argue, then sighed and settled back against the railings of the balcony. "You're right, Obi-Wan. I have an intellectual knowledge of it -- I could recite your sermon about obeying the Council by rote, if you wanted -- but I don't understand it here," he touched his chest lightly, "in my heart. Perhaps a man can only have so many masters, after all. The Force in all its aspects took whatever submission I had to give, the day Yoda took me, and left me nothing else."

"I know." Obi-Wan felt the prick of tears beginning again and shut his lids tight, determined not to let them fall. "I couldn't ask you to change that, not for a mere padawan's comfort."

Beside him, he heard Qui-Gon shift on the hard stone. "I have tried to moderate my behaviour for your sake, Padawan, if not always successfully. Ever since that mission to Delos, in fact; you would probably have been horrified if you'd known me before." Obi-Wan had been all of fourteen then, still smarting from his long period on trial after the debacle on Melidaan, and not ready to face a drawn-out battle with the Council over field tactics. "When I saw how upset it made you, I decided it was time to mend my ways in the small things, even though the large ones were beyond me."

"You tried to change -- for me?" Obi-Wan opened one eye to squint in the bright sunlight at Qui-Gon. He'd never imagined himself as having that much impact on his wilful master.

"Yes." The answer was gruff, yet it made Obi-Wan's breath catch, even though Qui-Gon qualified it immediately: "But I don't know if I was able to change enough for what you needed." He gave a dry laugh. "I can see why you might think the Ritual reflects our past, Padawan, given that it has nearly brought us to yet another almighty argument with the Council."

Obi-Wan smiled wanly. "I was just grateful you'd be willing to risk a row to keep me with you." He rested his chin on his knees, contemplating the railings in front of him. "But it mirrors our lives in other ways, too. Most of the Jedi I know divide their loyalties between their masters and their friends, or between the Temple and the family they've left behind. But for me, it's always the two of us, against everyone else. And after the Ritual, what are we doing but dashing off again, for a year in much greater isolation?" He noticed that Qui-Gon remained silent, saying nothing in disagreement this time. "It does seem that my life remains in rotation about yours, Qui-Gon. It's as if the Ritual were saying I'll spend my whole life working towards your goals, rather than my own."

Qui-Gon reached out to touch the sleeve of Obi-Wan's robe, fingering the soft material. "Even if the Ritual mirrors the past, does that mean it mirrors the future too? Look at Xani. If you were to judge from his Ritual, he found the submission hard but in the end he managed it. He gave himself over to the Force totally. Yet six years later he was a renegade and a murderer." He tugged at the sleeve, begging attention. "Surely he disproves your theory?"

Obi-Wan didn't want to say it. He didn't want to watch the hurt bloom in Qui-Gon's eyes.

But it had to be said. He covered Qui-Gon's hand with his own, stroking the long fingers tenderly. "Had you considered, my Master, that perhaps what Xanatos gave you at the end of the Ritual was only a rote submission, and nothing more?"

"No!" Qui-Gon's face contorted in vehement denial. "He did it with me! He let me in to his body, he accepted my seed!"

Quietly but implacably, Obi-Wan put the question. "So sure are you? Did he submit in his heart, as well as with his body? Or did he offer you nothing more than a lie?"

"I--" Qui-Gon broke off, and when he spoke again, his voice was a thread of sound. "I don't know." He turned his head away, but his fingers clutched at Obi-Wan's.

Obi-Wan returned their tight clasp, but considerately he averted his eyes, looking up at the air taxis hurtling past their balcony instead. The ships moved silently, the noise of their passing deadened by the transparisteel separating them from the two Jedi crouched below. In the quiet, Obi-Wan couldn't prevent himself hearing the short, harsh sounds that were suspiciously like a grown man choking down tears.

Each one tore at him, but, horrifyingly, each one angered him too. Xanatos had never been worthy of the pains Qui-Gon had taken with him, much less those he had suffered at Xanatos' hands.

The sounds stopped, but it was minutes more before the tight grip on his hand slackened. Obi-Wan turned back to find Qui-Gon resting against the railings, eyes dry and bright though there was a telltale dampness on one sleeve of his tunic.

Carefully, deliberately, Qui-Gon hid the small patch of moisture, resting his hands on his thighs flat against the thin cotton. He held them as still as if they had been clasped in his robe, and his voice was equally steady when he spoke.

"You may be right. He is dead and only the Force knows now. But even if it happened like that, I won't lay the blame at his door alone. Perhaps I fooled myself, or let him fool me. I wanted to believe."

"But it was his choice, in the end," Obi-Wan could not help protesting, although he knew it would do no good. "We are free men: we all make our own choices, or so you told me this morning."

Qui-Gon shook his head. "Would you defend me even from myself, Obi-Wan? Still, the mysteries of the past are hard to fathom. Let us lay them aside, and discuss your choices instead. Perhaps," Qui-Gon paused for a moment, straightening his back against the rigid bars, "perhaps you should reconsider coming to Malabar with me."

"What?" That was the very last thing Obi-Wan expected to hear him say. He shook his head in bemusement. "Why?"

"Whether or not you're right about the Ritual mirroring the future, there will always be conflict between us on this question of obedience to the Council. I don't want to taint you in their eyes, or interfere with your advancement. For I think you could go very far, my Padawan." Qui-Gon leant forward to capture Obi-Wan's chin in one hand, searching his face with earnest intent. "I think you will find the fame you seek, with or without me by your side -- and perhaps easier without my shadow hanging over you. You could leave me, take on a new master whose views more closely match your own. Mace would be willing; he's often expressed his interest in your progress -- and his belief that he could do better with you than I."

Obi-Wan snorted.

"He may well be right, Padawan." Qui-Gon released him and leant back, shutting his eyes against the sun. "You've already absorbed most of what I have to teach you about being a warrior. If you trained with him, you'd have time in the Temple to build yourself the place here that you seek. And you would learn a great deal about working with the Council; it would not be untoward for Mace to sponsor you into a seat there yourself, in due course. He could take you far, Obi-Wan."

Obi-Wan looked at Qui-Gon, sitting there quietly discussing a future without him. His master's face was smoothed, sunshine flattening the contours of harsh lines and sharp projections which normally gave it such definition. It was cleansed of all emotion by the light.

He'd been staring at Qui-Gon for a third of his life. Yet in three short days he had reversed his whole way of seeing. Or perhaps it had been in that one moment, when he watched passion recast those well-known features from master into lover. Either way, he knew that the face now presented to him was nothing but a mask, controlled as carefully as were the hands lying still on Qui-Gon's knees.

But Obi-Wan had seen Qui-Gon in the shadowed light of the room last night, tasting and touching with a greed for knowledge which could not be slaked with just one touch. What Qui-Gon had wanted to know was him, Obi-Wan Kenobi. And he had seen this man lying beneath him this morning, awe upon his face as Obi-Wan moved upon his body. Qui-Gon might have deceived himself about his own wants up until that moment, just as Obi-Wan had. But any further deception would be deliberate, and Obi-Wan would not tolerate it.

"So you don't want me guarding your back on this mission?" he asked. He didn't think Qui-Gon would lie to him over such a simple question.

"I do -- but I will live without."

An honest, if optimistic answer. "Ah. So then, you don't want me to be your padawan?" Obi-Wan watched Qui-Gon's face closely as he asked his next question.

"I do. Yet a Master, to be worthy of the name, must look to his padawan's training over his own desires." One central truth, said calmly, dispassionately, and Qui-Gon sought to obscure it by wrapping it in other irrelevant ones, his face very still as he waited for Obi-Wan's next question.

"So you don't love me?" Obi-Wan whispered, confident in the answer despite his hushed tone.

"I do love you," Qui-Gon answered, equally quiet. "Enough that I am happy to let you go, if that's what you need."

If Qui-Gon had dared to look at Obi-Wan then, perhaps Obi-Wan might have believed him. But in the gaze Qui-Gon fixed on his motionless hands, Obi-Wan read the lie.

"I won't ask if you want me."

Qui-Gon's pale cheeks flushed at that. Perhaps he was remembering the way he had wrapped his legs up over his padawan's shoulders, to be speared the more deeply. "Isn't it customary for questions to come in threes?" he rejoined, bereft of an adequate defence. "That makes your fourth."

"But it wasn't a question," Obi-Wan pointed out. He would not be deflected by such last-ditch manoeuvres. "You showed me the truth about that already, and I'm finding that your actions speak more clearly than your words. Besides, the Ritual is over: let's not invoke any more customs, if you please. But I do have a fourth question for you, Master Jinn," he continued inexorably, "and it is this. You may want me, and you may love me, but are you in love with me? Am I more than just your student, or your friend, or a bedmate?"

For rash words said in fever or lust were not enough; Obi-Wan needed sureties. He waited, breath indrawn, for the answer.

Under his anxious gaze, the stillness finally passed from his master's face. Qui-Gon relaxed at last, the unnatural tension leaving his long body as he smiled ruefully in acceptance of defeat. The flush on his cheeks was more pronounced, but this time he turned to look his padawan full in the face as he said, "I am in love with you, Obi-Wan Kenobi."

Simple, honest words, filled with an earnest yearning; and they were no less quietly expressed than the carefully chosen answers which had preceded them, but they were said with a total conviction. "You have been my beloved student," Qui-Gon went on, his eyes fixed warmly on Obi-Wan, "and then my dearest friend, and I loved you all the while. But this...it's utterly beyond all of those."

"Then tell me again you'd be happy to let me go," Obi-Wan said, testing boundaries in a measured challenge. "Tell me again to choose Mace as my master."

"Ah, I can't, young Padawan, much as I should," Qui-Gon said, shaking his head at his own inconsistency. He raised one finger to stroke down Obi-Wan's cheek in a delicate tickle of the tiny hairs there. "I'll have done with lies: I want you, and I love you, and I need you by my side. And worst of all, I am madly in love with you." Qui-Gon's words were almost whimsical, but behind them, reflected in his blue eyes, there was an upwelling of amazement and joy at the discovery.

Obi-Wan let his breath out in a long, relieved sigh. "Yes. That sounds better," he said with satisfaction. In that declaration, he could find at least one certainty to counterweigh the doubts and fears of the last few hours. He turned to brush his lips against Qui-Gon's finger as it traced the corner of his mouth.

"But none of that means you should give up your dreams for my desires, Obi-Wan," his master cautioned, sobriety masking the joy Obi-Wan had just seen; yet he let his touch linger on the curve of Obi-Wan's lips.

"Even if the Force wills me to?" Obi-Wan said softly, turning his words into caresses against Qui-Gon's skin with the movement of his lips in forming them.

"We are free men: we all make our own choices," Qui-Gon replied with a trace of regret, as if reminded of Obi-Wan's use of that very dictum to damn Xanatos.

And Obi-Wan didn't want him thinking about Xanatos just then. So he gave a sudden nip with sharp white teeth against Qui-Gon's palm, and almost laughed at the surprised yelp his master gave in response, at the startled laughter he could read in Qui-Gon's eyes. "I never thought I'd live to hear you, of all people, tell me to disregard the Will of the Force," he chided.

Qui-Gon flushed deeper red than he had before. "I should advise you to obey it -- but I couldn't be sure my motives weren't selfish. So instead all I ask is that you be sure of what the Force does will for you, my Padawan, before you acquiesce too readily. After all," and his voice grew drier, more strained, "I doubt that those daydreams of yours included taking a battered old Jedi master as a lover." But Obi-Wan noticed that he hadn't moved his hand away, and that his abused palm was nuzzling against the curve of Obi-Wan's chin, as if the scrape of stubble would ease the sting there.

"I don't care what the Force wills," Obi-Wan replied. Again laughter came close at the scandalised expression Qui-Gon turned on him. "Don't you see? It doesn't matter what the Force might have had planned, or what I'd planned for myself." He flicked his tongue against the tiny mark he had left on Qui-Gon's skin. "How could those things make any difference to me, after this morning? Do you honestly think I could ever leave you now?"

"This isn't a decision about your entire future, Obi-Wan!" Qui-Gon said urgently. "The Ritual doesn't have the power to doom you to anything. We're only discussing this one mission -- n-nothing more." His voice stumbled on the last words as Obi-Wan licked his skin again, slowly this time.

"Do you think I could leave you, once I've known what it's like to love you?" Obi-Wan continued, ignoring Qui-Gon's statement utterly. "To make love to you?" His voice dropped. "To be in love with you?"

"Obi-Wan, you don't need to tell me-- "

"Hush. You know it's true." He placed a kiss in Qui-Gon's palm, his lips tender, then looked up into Qui-Gon's eyes again. So many emotions chasing in those blue depths, and his so decisive master for once succumbing to uncertainty. "You might have had the strength of mind to let me leave," Obi-Wan said, his jaw thrust out, "but I'm not made of such stern stuff. I've taken you now, my Master, and I'm not letting go. Ever."

Qui-Gon groaned, a sound torn between doubt and acceptance, but Obi-Wan leaned forward to stopper his mouth with a soft kiss. Their lips clung, and suddenly it was a soft kiss no more, mouths opening hungrily to devour as their arms twined round each other, Obi-Wan snarling his fingers into Qui-Gon's hair as his master clutched him tight.

Finally they broke apart, panting, leaning away from each other in unspoken accord to catch their breaths. Qui-Gon was hard again, Obi-Wan realised headily -- and even more astounding was the knowledge that he had caused it, that he had the right to... He trailed his fingers down the line of Qui-Gon's tunics while Qui-Gon watched him with wondering eyes, finally bringing his hand to rest cupped over the warm mound lurking beneath Qui-Gon's thin leggings. His master gulped a deep breath as he stroked his thumb gently over the protrusion beneath the cloth.

"How could you have hidden this from yourself?" Obi-Wan marvelled, delicately tracing the growing bulge. "A Jedi Master, living so strongly in the present -- and yet you ignored this?" 'This' being the lust so blatantly written across his master's face, so brazenly swelling his cock.

Qui-Gon squirmed beneath his gentle fingers, hands twisting into Obi-Wan's cloak, but he didn't seek to still his padawan's explorations. "It wasn't part of the present, back then," he said breathlessly. "And I'm not noted for my prescience, unlike you. Besides, I wasn't thinking about it."

"Didn't you even consider it, on the few occasions when you remembered we still had to do the Ritual?" Obi-Wan wanted to understand how Qui-Gon could have closed his mind so ruthlessly against a desire as strong as the one moving him now. "Didn't you look forward to fucking me just a little bit?"

His fingers stilled at the guilty expression that flashed across Qui-Gon's face. "Master?"

"I'm sorry, Padawan." Qui-Gon untwined his fingers from Obi-Wan's cloak to reach for the hand at his groin, bringing it to his lips and placing a kiss on the now bunched fingers. "If I thought of the Ritual at all, it was to wish it over and done with, so we could get on with our lives together. Oh, I was fully aware that you had your charms. The queue lining up for your bedroom was a broad enough hint," and there was enough self-mockery in his tone to make Obi-Wan wince inside. "But that part of your life seemed to have nothing to do with me."

Qui-Gon sighed and brought Obi-Wan's closed fist higher between his cupped hands, so he could press his forehead against it, his hair swinging forward to hide his face. "The stupidest thing of all," he admitted in a quiet voice, "was that once upon a time I had looked forward to having a sexual experience in the Ritual -- with Xani."

Obi-Wan instinctively tried to withdraw his hand, but Qui-Gon's grip tightened, not letting him go. "I didn't mean that to be hurtful, Padawan. Please, let me explain," he said, and the soft plea was enough to have Obi-Wan biting back his own angry words.

Qui-Gon must have taken his padawan's silence for consent, for he sat back, his hold relaxing when he saw that Obi-Wan was not pulling away. "You must understand that teaching Xani was constantly stimulating, my Obi-Wan," he began, voice low and earnest. "He was greedy for knowledge: techniques, information, languages -- anything at all. He soaked it up with a sheer lust for the very act of learning itself. Not like you."

He smiled fondly at his apprentice to take the sting out of his words, teasing Obi-Wan's fingers out of the fist they had made. "You take everything so seriously, so critically, trying to make each scrap of knowledge fit into your structure of how the universe works. But Xani -- he just wanted to know. His hunger for everything I could show him was a reminder to me of how exciting the world could still be." Qui-Gon rubbed his thumb slowly over the veins standing up on the back of Obi-Wan's hand, and his next words were hesitant, as if he were feeling his way to express himself.

"I knew Xani was relatively inexperienced in sex: he'd only had a few lovers, none of them any older or more sophisticated than himself, and all women. But I thought he'd approach the Ritual as he did his other lessons: eager to learn more, eager to enjoy it. And I was ready to enjoy it, too." An airship flew overhead, touching down on the Temple behind them, and the shadows of its passing darkened Qui-Gon's face for a moment.

"You desired him?" Obi-Wan asked, his voice raw. He didn't even know if he wanted to hear the answer. Surely Xanatos couldn't have had Qui-Gon's passion first, as well as everything else?

"I desired his enthusiasm," Qui-Gon corrected quietly. "I wanted to teach him more about what his body was capable of; and, while some masters choose to emphasise the element of submission in the Ritual, I didn't think it had to centre around that. We were neither of us ever inclined to stick to traditional interpretations of such things. Nor was there any reason to consider that his Ritual might turn out as -- dramatically, shall we say -- as my own." He sighed. "At the very least, I hoped he would find the experience novel; and Xani was always fascinated by the new. But I hoped he'd find it pleasurable, too."

His mouth twisted wryly. "It didn't happen that way, of course. As soon as we discussed undertaking the Ritual, it became clear to me how much he disliked the idea. He didn't want to make the emotional submission he believed it demanded of him. He wasn't taken with the concept of me touching him, either."

And how his gentle master would have been hurt by that. "I'm sorry," Obi-Wan whispered helplessly.

"Ah, Obi-Wan." Qui-Gon turned to rub his cheek against Obi-Wan's hand, the bristles lightly scratching. "It was a disappointment, but I could hardly blame him. He had nothing like your sexual experience to rely on, and worse, he rebelled against the whole concept of the Ritual. He thought it was an outdated barbarism borrowed from a dead people -- for the express purpose of humiliating padawans, I think he said."

Obi-Wan was sure those had been Xanatos' exact words.

Qui-Gon sighed again. "I would have delayed it, given him time to experiment with other male lovers. But it was the only thing stopping him from becoming a senior padawan, and he had worked so hard to reach that point. It seemed petty to hold him back for an exercise most of the Temple viewed with as little respect as he did. I agreed that we would go ahead, on the basis that we took as long over it as he needed. Three days, in the end. And afterwards," his voice stumbled, "I thought we had succeeded. I honestly did, even though there'd been scant enough pleasure in it for either of us."

Obi-Wan ducked his head, ashamed. That was a comfort Qui-Gon had clung to, until Obi-Wan had stripped it away from him.

Qui-Gon squeezed his hand and let it go. "Well, you can see why, after that, lust wasn't the first thing that came to mind when I thought of the Ritual. Which I didn't do very often; it was not an experience I liked to dwell on, I admit. And it didn't seem that I had to."

He chucked Obi-Wan under the chin with his thumb, until Obi-Wan looked up at him again.

"You're so different from Xani," he said, smiling down almost wistfully at Obi-Wan. "You had conquered all his problems -- his sexual ignorance, his unwillingness to submit to the Force -- years before. I certainly wasn't arrogant enough to think I had much left to teach you in bed, at any rate. So I fear I let myself be deceived into thinking it would be easy this time."

Obi-Wan sighed. "It must have been a shock when I turned out to be as much trouble."

"It took me aback, yes." Obi-Wan wrinkled his nose at the understatement, and Qui-Gon tapped it with a reproving finger. "In some ways you were worse, because at least with Xani his objections were clear. But there we were, with this thrice-damned deadline hanging over us; and you couldn't tell me what was upsetting you, and I could only fumble about, trying not to hurt you too much -- "

"Oh, Master, you didn't!" And Obi-Wan had to wind his arms around Qui-Gon now, this instant -- anything to banish the pained regret in his master's eyes. "You were kinder to me than I deserved, my love," he whispered, holding the heavy body tight against him, feeling Qui-Gon's hands coming to cling to his shoulders. Obi-Wan slipped his thigh over Qui-Gon's to straddle the bigger man, rocking their bodies together, while Qui-Gon buried his face in the curve of Obi-Wan's neck.

Obi-Wan stroked the soft fall of Qui-Gon's hair, cradling the skull beneath. "I was the one egging you on to complete the Ritual," he said, and oh, how terrible that he had tried to do that. "I should have faced my own feelings -- listened to the Force, or to my subconscious, or whatever it was that wouldn't accept you as anything less than a lover." Qui-Gon shuddered under his hands, and Obi-Wan held him tighter yet. "My lover," he repeated fiercely.

"Yes, my Padawan," Qui-Gon said meekly into the folds of his cloak, and, suspicious of such easy compliance, Obi-Wan tugged at the hair he had been fondling, pulling Qui-Gon's head back until he could see his master's face.

Qui-Gon was laughing up at him, eyes brilliant in the sunshine, his face alight with the uncomplicated joy Obi-Wan remembered from watching him in meditation. "My lover," Qui-Gon growled, and then Obi-Wan was plundering his lips to steal the words from them, while Qui-Gon's hands were pulling at his cloak to get to the hot skin beneath. Roughly, he tipped Qui-Gon's head back against the railings, thrusting his tongue as deep into his master's -- no, his lover's -- mouth as he could. Qui-Gon was tearing at Obi-Wan's tunics, and Obi-Wan moaned into the moist warmth of Qui-Gon's mouth when calloused palms grazed his nipples. He had no idea how they had reached a flashpoint like this so fast, but he didn't care.

Panting against Qui-Gon's open mouth, his legs spread wide over Qui-Gon's hips, he gripped the railings for the leverage to push down and began to grind his pelvis against his master's groin. Qui-Gon's cock must have been leaking a little, because the cloth between them was soon damp, the extra friction tortuously exciting against the tender flesh of his perineum. In moments his own erection was prodding urgently against the swell of Qui-Gon's stomach.

And Qui-Gon was inciting him to further action, his tongue tangling with Obi-Wan's, his hands digging in to Obi-Wan's hips in an effort to press them even closer together. He was moaning faintly, his eyes tight shut, his face flushed --

Oh no. Obi-Wan groaned aloud and sat back, making Qui-Gon gasp at the sudden weight on his thighs. His eyelids fluttered open and he stared, dazed, at Obi-Wan. "What?"

"You're feverish again," Obi-Wan replied flatly.

Qui-Gon began to swear.

"Is this going to happen every time?" Obi-Wan interrupted the stream of curses. "Because it is intensely frustrating, my Master. Not to mention somewhat dangerous if it happens in the middle of a mission," there being no doubt that he intended to fuck Qui-Gon during the next year; in fact, during the next twentyfour hours. "Perhaps we need to talk to Master Yoda--"

They stared at each other.

"The Council meeting!" they chorused.

"Gods, Obi-Wan, get off me. I'm due there in two ko, and I'll have to change these leggings now." Flustered, Qui-Gon plucked at the damp stain.

Obi-Wan slid from his perch on his master's thighs. "Your hair needs combing again, too," he said critically, ignoring the fact that it was his hands which had done the damage. "And I need a shower..."

"No." Qui-Gon suddenly stilled. "You stay here, Obi-Wan. There's no need for you to come, now that we've completed the Ritual to the Council's satisfaction. And you could do with the extra time for meditation: there'll be little enough in the weeks ahead, Force knows. I'll be back by the evening."

He was about to launch into protest, but his master's slightly guilty air stopped him.

Oh. Of course. Qui-Gon was going to tell the Council that his padawan -- his senior padawan -- was coming on the mission. And then he was going to face down any and all of their objections, wheedle, cajole and bully them until they agreed; and if that didn't work, he would flat out refuse the mission until they did. And he didn't want Obi-Wan there to watch.

Whether he preferred not to implicate Obi-Wan in his disobedience, or he thought he could act more outrageously without his padawan present to restrain him, or he simply wanted to spare Obi-Wan the discomfort of another fractious meeting with the Council, Obi-Wan didn't know. But, he admitted to himself, for once he was grateful to take the escape route Qui-Gon had offered him, and abandon his master to cope alone. So he sat silent while Qui-Gon hauled himself to his feet, gripping the railing in an uncommon show of weakness.

"Will you be alright?"

"The fever should drop more quickly this time, once I'm out of your company." Qui-Gon steadied himself and crossed the tiny balcony to the open door in two long strides. "I'll talk to Yoda afterwards, if you like. He should be able to say how soon I'll stop having these reactions to you, and what we can do about them in the meanwhile."

That was another meeting he was happy to be shot of: Qui-Gon and Yoda discussing sex. "Tell him abstinence is not a feasible alternative," Obi-Wan instructed drily.

Qui-Gon paused, bracing himself against the doorframe. "You're sure, Obi-Wan?" he asked, and his voice was suddenly less certain.

Obi-Wan knew the question had nothing to do with any advice Yoda might give; but he did not have to consider his answer. "I'm a free man, Qui-Gon," he stated quietly, "and I've made my choice."

Qui-Gon dipped his head in acknowledgement, his eyes closing briefly, the lines by his mouth easing. Then he was gone, the door whisking shut behind him.

Obi-Wan watched the trajectories of the aircars streaking past overhead.

He had managed no more than a light meditative trance before he'd been roused again by the sounds of his master leaving their rooms. Qui-Gon had not come to say anything more to him, and Obi-Wan had not called out to stop him leaving. So now there was little to do but sit, and watch the ships.

Occasionally, one would cut away from the rigid lines of the traffic grid, describing a elegant curve as it swooped down to a landing platform in the maze of buildings below. There was beauty in the structure of the long lanes, endlessly replicating cohorts of ships all moving in symphony. But there was beauty, too, in the independent flight of the mavericks, as they plunged to a destination only they sought.

He wondered if Qui-Gon had believed him.

Not that he had lied. Nothing so simple would have done in an effort to mislead a Jedi master. The elision of aspects of the truth, though: that was a more subtle art.

It was no pretense that he had wanted an undying fame. What young child staring up at the stars did not dream of having his name counted amongst them? What adolescent beginning to grasp the true nature of infinity did not shy away from it, seeking a shield against its enormity? What young man seeing death did not look to cheat its immolation? Every word he had told Qui-Gon was true. He desperately wanted one great deed to mark his own passing. He wanted to have mattered.

Yet, by his understanding of the Ritual, in some complex, convoluted fashion his own goals would become subservient to his master's desires. Qui-Gon's choices would overshadow his.

Obi-Wan sighed, shifting on his shins. How Qui-Gon found this position comfortable, he could not comprehend. Even with the cushion beneath him, it hurt after a time. Grimacing at the pins and needles, he sat back in his old, accustomed stance, ankles on thighs.

He supposed he would have to talk with Yoda alone, some day when Qui-Gon was not present, to get a better perspective of what had just happened. He was fairly sure he was correct: the Ritual did predict the future. There was a symmetry in the idea, and he had found such balance time and time again whenever he came closer to the core of the Unifying Force, unfolding its layers to admire the patterns within. He did not fool himself that he had reached a full understanding of the Ritual, for every layer revealed was just the doorway into another, each simpler in structure than the one before, yet each more difficult to penetrate. Until he was at one with the Force, he would never reach total comprehension of the nature of his body's resistance to Qui-Gon's touch during the Ritual, much less his intuitions of the future.

But he had guessed that the first thing Qui-Gon would do, as soon as he recovered from his fever, would be to question Obi-Wan's understanding of the lessons the Ritual had taught him. Qui-Gon was ever the Master, no matter what other roles he cared to play in Obi-Wan's life.

Obi-Wan would not have Qui-Gon know the truth of this lesson, bitter as it had been. Obi-Wan would not have Qui-Gon know the extent of the submission the Ritual had demanded of him. So he had prepared one truth for Qui-Gon, told him about one desire yielded up - and used that to shield the other, deeper desires he knew now he would never fulfill.

Contrarily, his own success at the duplicity twisted in him like a snake, biting him deep. Renown? Reputation? A Jedi craved not these. For what sort of Jedi would rank fame above the love Qui-Gon had offered him that morning? And even if Obi-Wan gained eternal fame, it would shrink to mere ephemerality and pass in a second, compared to the permanence of that one shared moment together. He would have been the greatest fool, to regret choosing love over fame.

Did Qui-Gon really think him so shallow?

The idea hurt, even though he hoped his master would remain unsuspecting of his deception. But -- it was not easy to deceive a Jedi Master. How Xan had managed it, if indeed he had, Obi-Wan could not fathom. Obi-Wan had unscrupulously taken advantage of Qui-Gon's every weakness to turn his master's attention from his unJedi-like behaviour. After all, Qui-Gon had been recovering from a fever, his mind occupied with the Ritual and the mission ahead of them, his body urging him into Obi-Wan's arms with no room for thought of any kind. That, it seemed, had been enough to let Obi-Wan's version of events stand.

Perhaps, with Xan, all it had taken was Qui-Gon's willingness to believe. Obi-Wan's mouth twisted.

But then, perhaps he was the one easily gulled, to accept his master's acquiescence so readily. Even if Qui-Gon did not yet suspect Obi-Wan's deception, he might think harder on his padawan's words, now that the fever and the urgency had left him, and find them wanting. Or perhaps Qui-Gon was well aware that his apprentice had not told him everything, but had decided to let it lie till they were away to Malabar, where Qui-Gon would have months to pick the truth out of him. His master's patience in such matters had unearthed many an adolescent secret; Obi-Wan shuddered to think of the techniques Qui-Gon might feel free to use on him, now they were lovers. No, one could never take a Jedi Master for granted.

And Obi-Wan had been taking this particular Jedi Master for granted for a long, long time. It had been easy, while Qui-Gon was such a fixture in his life. No need to examine his feelings for a Master who was always there for him, no need to acknowledge Qui-Gon's primacy over any other, lover or friend. For fucking his master hadn't really changed anything between them. He felt the same for Qui-Gon as he had for many years: he loved him. And if he now understood the nature of that love a little better, had stepped through another doorway to come closer to understanding its essence, it was a difference of degree rather than kind. It was only his blindness which had previously stopped him seeing the passion nesting in his own devotion.

Two days ago, sitting in the cold lavabo and looking at the mess he had made of his first attempt at the Ritual, he had compared himself to the tribesfolk on Tremansis V. They spent their entire lives oblivious of the pack of carnivorous wyvers preying on their weak and young, ignorant of the beast which threatened their very existence. He'd thought them fools, and himself equally as stupid for ignoring the impending Ritual.

But it was not foolishness at all. It was cowardice. He hung his head, ashamed.

His had been a wilful ignorance, a deliberate refusal to face the implications of what loving Qui-Gon meant. Flirting with his friends, imagining himself entranced by this pair of brown eyes, that sombre smile, he had thrilled with the danger of playing at love, had sighed with disappointment when he'd thought himself heart-whole once more. Only the risk of separation from Qui-Gon had finally brought Obi-Wan to honesty. How ironic, that all the while he'd believed himself safe, he had been living in the maw of the beast.

He tucked his face into the pillow of his arms.

He had had hopes, of course. He had hoped for love, and comradeship, and a home to return to at the end of each mission, a permanent refuge if he were lucky enough to grow old. All unassuming wants, mature and sensible if somewhat ambitious for a Jedi uncertain of what the next day would bring him. Those were the hopes of the padawan, one day to be knight, who was a capable, dedicated Jedi before anything else.

Then there was the idealist, who had dreamt of something more: more than fame now or for the future, more than friendship and fondness, more than the oneness with the Force which he eagerly anticipated as his final reward for the trials life brought. He could almost blush for it: a child's self-centred dream, even if it were grounded in the desires of an adult man.

He wanted someone to burn for him.

He wanted to hold his lover's heart in the palm of his hand. He wanted to be able to drive his lover to distraction, with just a touch of his finger against expectant lips. He wanted a lover who would give up anything for him: deny all prior claims of friendship, love or duty; put aside all ambition, all hope, all honour, all conscience. He wanted to be the candle flame to which the moth flew, even as its wings were crisped with fire.

Oh, and he would give his lover the very same! Even unto his knighthood, and his soul, and his self.

But, if he stayed with Qui-Gon, he would be the one to burn, and he would burn alone.

It was not that Qui-Gon would not love him. He quivered, remembering the wild joy in his master's eyes -- and he had put that there! Him, Obi-Wan Kenobi. He was a capable enough padawan, a good enough man, but nothing he had done in all his nineteen years made him worthy of that one look. He had thought Qui-Gon beautiful when the Living Force was moving through him, but now that he had seen love on his master's face, he began to understand the rapture and serenity Qui-Gon found within the Force. To see that look again: it was worth any sacrifice.

And the sacrifice the Force had asked of him, the submission he was to make, was this: that he would never be first in his lover's eyes.

He supposed he had always known it, and always fled from it. But the Ritual had forced him to face that painful truth, by showing it to him again and again. After all, he thought sourly, how many padawans had to share their Rituals with their predecessor? A rite which should have been between Qui-Gon and Obi-Wan alone had been overshadowed too often by Xanatos. It was more than a trick of circumstance, more than an outcome of Qui-Gon's unhappy memories: it was the Unifying Force showing Obi-Wan the extent of what he had to give up.

Not that his sacrifice had anything to do with Xanatos, really. Though Obi-Wan did wonder whether his master had been disingenuous -- or self-deluding -- when he had said he hadn't desired Xan. Perhaps Qui-Gon, too, had had dreams, greater than his hopes of simply teaching Xanatos another exercise, and had quietly put them aside without even acknowledging them; perhaps there had been one genuine submission that day sixteen years ago, even if it wasn't Xan's.

Yet Obi-Wan had no fear that he couldn't banish Xanatos from Qui-Gon's mind whenever he chose. All he had to do was press his lips to Qui-Gon's fingers, and his master would be wholly his once more. No, Xanatos was just a ghostly reminder of a stronger force, one it was beyond Obi-Wan's power to defeat.

Huddling in his cloak, he remembered his master's arms warm around him that morning, though not in lovemaking. Qui-Gon had comforted him, holding him close even while he spoke the words Obi-Wan had grieved and raged to hear: But before all else I must follow the Will of the Force, and then I must follow what I know to be right.

With that affirmation, he had refused to take Obi-Wan through the Ritual, regardless of the consequences for them both. He would have risked his own death, alone on a dangerous mission, or jeapordised Obi-Wan's apprenticeship -- or put his own rank as master under threat. Anything, except go against the Will of the Force.

For Qui-Gon Jinn put his devotion to the Force above all else. He found the one goal he believed it had revealed to him, and cleaved wholly unto it, no matter the cost, no matter if it meant abandoning those he loved and those who loved him. Yoda had seen this fierce independence in him when he was only eighteen, and had left him to face the submission of his Ritual, alone, on a dead planet. He was doomed to go his own way, in the end.

And if Obi-Wan had cherished any false hopes that Qui-Gon might change when they were lovers, all he had to do was remember his master's words: I can't be other than myself, even for you.

Too late, Obi-Wan gave his answer to the absent man. "Oh, my master," he pleaded, "to be second in the stories they will tell is one thing; but to be second in your life? I don't know if I can bear that." Yet he whispered it, very low, as if Qui-Gon might overhear.

He had no doubt about the sincerity of Qui-Gon's words, for his master seldom lied. But it hurt so much to give up those hopes. Would the Force leave Obi-Wan no ideals, no dreams with which to ease the hard life ahead? Did he have to yield them all?

He was only nineteen. It didn't seem fair.

The prickle of tears stung his eyes again, and this time he bowed his head and let them fall, for there was no-one to see.

He didn't weep for very long. He had made his choice, and it was not in him to indulge in histrionics. Besides, if Qui-Gon were successful in the Council chamber, there would be plenty to finish organising this evening: clothes and weapons to chase up from supplies, his master's schedule to clear, a language course in Malabarese to track down in the library. They probably all spoke Basic anyway, but sometimes a secret knowledge of the local languages could give a useful advantage. Knowledge of Old Dahometh had been useful at any rate, he smiled wryly to himself.

He mopped his face with the corner of his cloak and straightened his back. They would leave for Malabar in two days -- for he had no doubt that Qui-Gon would win. In fact, Obi-Wan didn't think there would be much opposition, now that Qui-Gon could legitimately claim him as a senior padawan. The Council had had ample opportunity to note how well he and his master worked together; while they might have misgivings about pushing Obi-Wan beyond his abilities, Obi-Wan was sure they would prefer not to split apart such a strongly bonded pair.

Some of the Councillors might even have assumed they had already taken a further step in their relationship; in retrospect, he realised that Mace would have been unlikely to suggest they pose as lovers on the mission, unless he also thought they would welcome the roles. So the petition for another master to take Qui-Gon's place in the Ritual must have come as rather a shock, then.

It would be up to Qui-Gon to dispell any newly-aroused scepticim about their pairing this afternoon. He could have done it more easily with Obi-Wan at his side to provide living proof of their new closeness -- and wouldn't that have led to a very interesting Council meeting indeed, Obi-Wan thought. He wondered whether they could have kept their hands off each other in the Council chamber, given the way desire had flared so dramatically between them. He'd never had reason to doubt his master's control before, but now.... Thank the Force they had a full year undercover to experience each other as lovers, away from the Temple gossip in the relative peace and quiet of a war-torn planet.

Obi-Wan was more concerned with what Yoda might say, when Qui-Gon spoke with him privately afterwards. He didn't fear for Yoda's opposition - but suppose the ancient Jedi said Qui-Gon's reactions to Obi-Wan simply had to run their course until Qui-Gon could control them? Could they make love tonight, or not?

Now that was a thought. He could just imagine the look on Master Ibbith's face tomorrow, if Qui-Gon turned up for his medical exam with a raging fever. Reluctantly, Obi-Wan grinned. Then he remembered that he hadn't yet warned Qui-Gon about the medical, and grinned some more. And as for the idea of Qui-Gon trying to explain the cause of his symptoms to Master Ibbith....

Obi-Wan laughed out loud. Perhaps he wouldn't mention the appointment to Qui-Gon till tomorrow, after all. That way, Qui-Gon might let Obi-Wan fuck him tonight.

Or Qui-Gon might fuck him. He sobered, excitement clawing laughter out of his stomach. So quick and hot the lust had burned between them, for two men used to seeing each other as friend and partner, Master and Padawan. His eyes opened wide at the wonder of it. There was a small patch of dampness on his leggings still, testimony to Qui-Gon's hunger. Reaching his hand down between his crossed legs, he rubbed a fingertip there, then brought it to his face. The smell of Qui-Gon's semen, rich in his nostrils, brought memories of the night before tumbling through his mind. Remembering the skills Qui-Gon had shown with his mouth alone, Obi-Wan trembled to consider what he could do with his cock, and his hands. He imagined that hunger given free rein upon his body, his knees over Qui-Gon's shoulders this time, his arse being pounded by that splendid cock. There was so much he had yet to discover about his new lover.

Oh, yes, his master might just fuck him, no matter what Yoda's advice. If Obi-Wan were to brush against him as they laid the table together for dinner, just a touch of one body against another, no more. And if he were to lick his lips after drinking, his tongue protruding enough for Qui-Gon to see. Then they might land up on that big bed together, and he could watch his master's face convulse in orgasm once more.

Or perhaps Qui-Gon would walk through the balcony door this evening, and simply fold Obi-Wan into his arms, holding him tight. Then they would sit entwined together, and watch the setting sun glinting off the aircars flowing by.

Obi-Wan watched as two aircars detached themselves from the steady stream of traffic and came swooping down, pirouetting together as they plummeted to the Temple landing pad below him. Their shadows danced over his face.

It would be enough.

~~~~~ The End~~~~~

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