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Daemons born in slavery – as well as the ones raised to be the Jedi – have a habit of settling early.
For all that Anakin is an exception in everything else, in this, at least, he follows the rule.
He is nine years old when Mukta stills suddenly in the middle of a workday, shrieks and shifts for the last time, her dirt-black fur giving way to sand-brown and creamy-white feathers, long talons gripping his skinny shoulder tightly as she desperately tries to find some purchase. She’s almost too big to sit there comfortably, but she manages, somehow, and now she looks down at him archly thanks to her curved beak and the proud line of her neck, and she’s absolutely magnificent.
A hawk of some kind, he figures, and Anakin is only glad that she’s a bird.
They’ve always wanted to fly, and now Mukta can. Forever.
When Mom sees them that night, she figures it out immediately and smiles at them, joyful. Her quiet sand cat daemon slinks close to them and nuzzles Mukta’s feathers as Shmi says, gently, “Oh, Ani. I’m so proud.”
(That night Anakin gets more for dinner than he’s had in months. It’s not until years later that he realizes that Shmi must’ve cut her rations short to treat him.)
A week later, a Jedi, a queen and a gungan arrive in Watto’s shop.
Their lives are never the same afterwards.
Darth Vader does not have a daemon.
He does not need a daemon.
Still, while he’s dying in Luke’s arms, mask taken off for the first time in more than two decades, he sees something golden shimmering from the corner of his eye.
The shape looks like it has wings.
Padmé Amidala Naberrie has a butterfly for a daemon, a fragile, iridescent-black and bright sun-yellow creature that rests calmly in the rich curls of her hair. People have a habit of looking at them, seeing her small stature and delicate soul, and thinking them weak.
Padmé rather pities them for their shortsightedness.
Chariton titters amusement in her ear, his brightly-colored wings beating a gentle wind in her hair and lets them think whatever they like.
Padmé Amidala does not need a dangerous daemon to be a threat. (That’s what blasters are for, anyway.)
Anakin and Mukta are the only ones who do not think weak when they meet them for the first time.
They think angel instead. Otherworldly. Powerful. Beautiful.
How could Padmé not love them afterwards?
Even if it’s forbidden. Even if it kills them.
“They said I’m too clever,” says Obi-Wan, strung up in yet another cell, in yet another Separatist stronghold, waiting for Anakin and Mukta to save him. (It’s their turn anyway.) “That’s why they took me first.”
Shiva is not similarly restrained, mostly because she has a collar around her neck which shocks her every time she comes too close to his cuffs for comfort. She stays clinging to his shoulders instead, her long tail wrapped around his upper arm like a vice.
She leans down slightly so that he can look at her small, grey-skinned face. “We are. You know that.”
Obi-Wan smiles. “It does not become a Jedi to feel pride,” he says. “We tell that to Anakin often enough.”
“Mukta is even more arrogant,” Shiva says, and sounds fond; she’s always more open when they’re alone. And you can’t get more alone than an unsupervised single cell. “And besides, I though we’re charming. That’s what Yoda says when he throws us at the media. Well, implies.”
“We’re both,” Obi-Wan concludes. “And the media likes the way we look, I think. That’s why Yoda sends us.”
Shiva looks at his copper head and then at her matching fur. She snickers irreverently.
They spend a few minutes in silence.
Obi-Wan sighs. “Where are they, anyway? They should have already gotten here.”
Something explodes in the base. There are few screams and then a sound of blasterfire.
“Oh never mind,” he says, and Shiva titters in amusement as they ready themselves to be rescued. Again.
At Mustafar, Shiva clings to him desperately, and Obi-Wan suspects that she’s trying not to wail in despair.
As he fights Anakin – Darth Vader, he has to remind himself, he’s Darth Vader now – Mukta is nowhere to be seen.
It hurts.
Sheev Palpatine carries a small, unbreakable container in his pocket, the kind that keeps fragile insectoid daemons safe.
Nobody ever sees his daemon. She’s brittle, the rumors say.
Darth Sidious is a Sith Lord. He does not have a daemon.
Nobody’s ever seen Yoda’s daemon. It’s one of the greatest mysteries in the Jedi Order.
When Vlastimir settles, Leia takes one look at him, perching proudly on the back of a chair, and grins. “You’re magnificent,” she says and the hawk preens, ruffling his warm brown feathers proudly.
When Breha sees them that afternoon she smiles and says they will be having something special for dinner. Bail’s face is a stone mask of polite interest, the kind he usually wears during boring meetings where he can’t afford to insult anyone.
Leia’s eyes zero on the expression. “What’s wrong?” she asks, because she’s almost as sharp at thirteen as she will be at nineteen.
Bail shakes his head, his daemon wrapping around his neck in comfort, her scales glinting in the light. “Nothing,” he says, and sounds sincere. Leia’s eyes narrow and Vlastimir’s grip on her shoulder tightens. “You reminded me of your biological father for a moment. His daemon was very similar.”
Leia knows she’s adopted. She does not care very much. Breha is her mother and Bail is her father, and that’s all that matters. Still, she’s somewhat curious now. “Was he a good man?” she asks. If he had a soul almost identical to hers, that’s an important question.
Bail hesitates for a fraction of a second and then says, “He was a great man.”
Leia is determined to become a senator one day. She easily recognizes the evasion.
Afterwards, when they’re already alone in their room, Vlastimir looks at her with dark eyes and steady gaze, and says, determined, “We can do great.”
Years later, Leia sits in Resistance base and remembers that particular conversation.
Her husband is dead. Her son has gone Dark. Her brother is in hiding.
And her name is known to the whole galaxy.
“Are we good?” she asks Vlastimir, her wrinkled hand resting on the still glossy feathers.
“We are great,” her daemon answers, and he sounds bitter.
Everyone knows that Luke Skywalker will not stay on Tatooine his whole life, no matter what Owen Lars may preach.
Whoever heard of a man with koala daemon living on a desert planet? Ridiculous.
Worse, Luke knows it too, yearns for freedom of space with all his might and that, he thinks, is what Uncle Owen can never forgive. Too similar to his father, is a common complaint when Luke’s wanderlust comes up in conversation. And Owen Lars does not seem to hold Anakin Skywalker in a very high regard.
Still, even his soul knows that he will leave someday, and that makes Luke hopeful, even while Natela tries to remain a voice of reason, to lower his hopes so he would not be disappointed.
Luke is right in the end. He only wishes that it does not take his only family dying for that to happen.
He leaves. He never comes back and nobody’s surprised.
Whoever heard of a koala in a desert anyway?
“We made a mistake, didn’t we?” Luke asks, years later on Ahch-To. Luke has never run away from trouble before. He does now; all the younglings are dead and Ben killed them. He can’t go back and face Han. Face Leia.
Natela, his voice of reason, clambers into his lap. “We made many of them.”
Luke sighs and buries his fingers in her thick fur. “I don’t think we can fix this one,” he decides and thinks of child-sized bodies.
The koala is silent for one long second. “No,” she agrees, quietly, reluctantly. “No, we can’t.”
Luke sometimes wishes that he stayed on Tatooine, ignorant.
Han Solo meets Princess Leia Organa and is immediately wary.
Mostly because Saira is half-smitten, half-scared shitless. It’s kind of amusing. And pathetic.
“Ok, I get the smitten part,” Han asks when they’re alone aboard Millennium Falcon. “Her Worship is hot. And the bird doesn’t look half-bad either. But why scared?”
Saira huffs. “He’s a predator,” she answers, and her stump of a tail – it was bitten off some years back during a particularly bad smuggling run – flicks from side to side in a way it tends to do whenever she thinks about the hawk. “They both are. Don’t you get it? They’re dangerous.”
And Han, who is a smuggler for thrill as much as for money, who is half in love with the deadly coldness of space, can’t resist something that could easily hurt him. Or kill him.
He loves it instead.
He loves Ben too, with all his heart. Even more than he’s ever loved Leia.
That does kill him in the end. He’s not terribly surprised.
Han’s always been half in love with danger.
When Leia gives birth, they name the boy Ben, for a Jedi that saved them all.
When his daemon is finally formed from golden dust, Vlastimir looks at the small puppy, tilts his head and says, “Nada,” his voice firm. “We’ll call her Nada. It means hope.”
It’s a bitter sort of memory.