#only Charm and Captain Tooka left!

[b-radley66]

Preview - The Great Corellian Betrothal Circus

Posts Monday on AO3, here: https://archiveofourown.org/users/B_Radley/works. 

Two different excerpts.

Meglann Florlin takes a deep breath as she watches Bryne Covenant move his hand to the doorbell, next to a plain door on a small well-kept house. She looks around at the secluded, warm neighborhood on the outskirts of Cosaintheas, the Shield of the South of the main Corellian continent. She notices that Bryne is looking back at her before he rings the bell. He reaches back with his left arm and pulls her close to him. She feels his lips against her still-growing out bronze curls. She closes her eyes. 

“You okay, Meglann? We can still turn around, if you’re not ready.”

She opens her mouth to reply.

“No, actually you can’t, hardhead,” comes a new voice.

Bryne whirls around, his eyes wide at the woman standing framed in the door, a stout cane in front of her, her hands stacked on the knob. Meglann’s eyes track to her face, to the blue eyes gazing at them curiously, but with a tiny hint of suspicion. The old woman’s lips are set, but one side quirks up with suppressed amusement. 

“And why can’t we?” Meglann asks before her mind engages.

“Because you’re already committed—standing here on my porch, girl,” she says. “You’ve gotten this far. If you turn back now, that would imply that you’re a coward.” 

Meglann feels the heat rise as she crosses her arms. The woman holds her hands up, the cane held loosely in one hand. “Peace, love,” she says. “Those brown eyes—that sparkle before the spark—can only belong to someone related to Elann Florlin.”

Both Bryne and Meglann look at one another. “Have you ever met Elann, ma’am?” Bryne asks. Meglann fights a smirk as she sees the charm dialed up a notch in his grin and his drawling inflection.

The older woman stares at him before rolling her eyes. “Don’t try that poodoo with me, your Eminence. I don’t have much to do these days, but I see your face and name all over the holosheets. You seem to be a bit busy, sniffing around like a three-balled tooka,” she says, the humidity in her voiced dropping by several points. “I didn’t get to be a full Sava at two major Universities by being unable to resist a half-way pretty Corellian grin.”

Meglann rolls her eyes as he looks at her and mouths, half-way? 

The resident of the house turns her attention back to Meglann, who is fighting laughter. “So tell me. Have you managed to become one of his conquests? Will I see your face on the holosheets?”

“Might be too late not to be in the Tattler,” Meglann admits, with her own dry tones. “Not quite a conquest.” She smiles warmly, looking at him. “He and a few others are very dear to me.”

For the first time the old woman smiles broadly. “Well said,” the Sava remarks. She reaches out and runs her finger along Meglann’s jaw. “I can see your father in you, as well, girl. Right along your jawline.” Meglann looks down and away at the touch. “He told me how much Elann meant to him. Even up to his last letter. He was so proud to tell me that he had a daughter—as soon as he found out.”

The old woman steps out onto the porch; pulls Meglann into her arms. She feels a warm pair of lips against her cheek. “I’m Sulen Gallamby. I was once known as Sulen Dao.

“I guess that I’m your grandmother.”

+=+=+=+=+=

Ahsoka shakes her head. Rather than return the volley, she changes the subject to calm the fire-red blushes of the co-pilot. “So this is where the coordinates led us?” she asks.

Sylvanus Helm, the first officer, speaks up from the holotank. He consults a datapad. “Yep,” he says. “At least the first leg, to activate the next leg in the Kuat files.”

Ahsoka nods. “Thanks, Obie,” she says. She grins. “Wow, you actually didn’t call me ‘ma’am’,” she adds. “You’ve come a long way.”

Tamsin laughs. “He’s just glad that Jorg here has to listen to tales of your appreciation of my awesomeness—the double entendres—and blush his way through a watch.”

Ahsoka looks away, her smile fading as she thinks of how they had acquired those Kuat files. She knows that Tamsin sees her expression; watches her get up to walk over to her. She shakes her head quickly. The Captain nods, her eyes actually showing a tiny bit of concern, before another smirk creases them. 

She reaches out to the Force, hoping against hope to see the green, purple, and gold light that signifies that her hunt-brother, Bryne Covenant, can touch the mystical partner that binds them. The man who had risked everything, to find the information they were using to locate the half-mythical Katana project. A small fleet of powerful frigates, missing since the beginning of the Clone War. Covenant had found the data, while helping Meglann to free herself from a grasping, powerful Moff. A man who had tried to add her to his collection of legacies, much as he had tried with her mother. Jano Secor had failed spectacularly in both attempts.

She sighs. There is nothing in her Force-sense. She sees Tamsin looking at her intently again. 

“You know, you two are the biggest idiots when it comes to each other,” she says. 

Ahsoka feels her anger spark. Tamsin smiles calmly. “I can see it on your face, Fulcrum. Tempest would probably tell you that he did everything because of the sacrifices you made; just as you’re thinking about his.” 

Ahsoka feels her anger fade. She turns away from the viewport. She’s not wrong, she thinks to herself. I’ll never tell her so, though. She starts to say something; just as a buzzing sensation forms in her Force-sense.

“Proximity alarm,” Obie yells. “Large hyperspace displacement!”

“Shields!” Ahsoka yells. She manages to catch a glimpse of an elongated boom, with a tall superstructure at one end and an engine housing at the other.

A Nebulon-B escort frigate. Just like those in the Katana project.

The world explodes in front of her. Her eyes lock on Jorg, the young co-pilot; his expression of terror as he is catapulted into space. She reaches out to the Force and yanks.