Disclaimer: Star Wars and characters are the property of Lucasfilms. No infringement is intended and no money has been made.

Rating: R for sexual content.

Warnings: Contains adult situations and references to incestuous relationships that some readers might find offensive. Please do not continue if "adult" fanfic offends you.

Note: This was one of the first fics I wrote so go easy on it. I'd always wondered how, after learning they were twins, Luke and Leia dealt with the knowledge that they had been sexually attracted to each other. This is my version of what happened.

By

NorthernStar

The nights on Hevah were twice as long as those on Tattoine and twice as dark. And so cold it could freeze the blood in his veins. Luke Skywalker stared out of his little room's window into an alien star scape.

This was different than he imagined it would be. The rebellion. Being a hero.

It wasn't meant to be this lonely.

Months had passed since the destruction of the Death Star. He'd first thought the unsettled feeling inside him would fade away in time, but it hadn't. Perhaps he was being to optimistic; he had lost the people who had been as near to him as parents as well as a teacher, and a friend. Grief needed to be worked through; you could not expect it to simply go away.

But he'd at least expected to feel at home here, like he belonged at last.

But no. He was as out of place here as he had been from the day he was born.

He filled the role he'd been given here as a pilot, knew he was respected and admired for his skills. But he still experienced the sense of being a square peg trying to fit into a round hole.

The door chimed and he said a quick come in.

"Hey, Kid, they're playing a friendly game of Sabacc down in the mess hall. You wanna join me?"

Luke looked around at Han with a smile. His friend too, was the wrong shape peg in life too. But unlike Luke, he didn't expect himself to change to fit. He expected everyone else too instead.

"No thanks."

"You sure 'bout that? You've been moping 'round in here for days, even that royal pain in butt is worried."

Mention of Leia sent a shiver down his back. "She…um, is she?"

"Yeah, and you can bet she's never had a concerned thought 'bout anyone else in her entire life."

"Heard she's a big fan of Sabacc actually," Han lied, "she'll probably be there to watch."

Luke sighed, recognising the lack of truth in that, but knowing Han wouldn't stop until he'd agreed.

"OK."

*****

The main mess hall was a haze of Gavva smoke and alcohol fumes. The noise was a single decibel below ear splitting. Luke sat hunched in a corner seat nursing a bluey-green drink Han had given him. It looked like Bantha's urine and probably tasted like it too. He hadn't worked up the courage to sample it yet and doubted he ever would. There were some things in life you could go without experiencing.

Luke had been there for several hours and quickly realised just how much more lonely you could feel in a room full of people than when on your own. He finally stood up, dropping the glass on the bar as he passed and walked out into the corridors of the Rebel Base. The noise gradually receded the further he got from the hall until it faded to nothing. He didn't feel like returning to his quarters and took the path leading out to the base grounds. There was a quiet place among the sensors, ion cannons and ground crews that he'd found some weeks ago, a garden of remembrance created for the fallen. Flowers had been planted and a stone erected. Someone had placed a bench there too.

He sat down and let the calm and peace of the garden wash over him. He'd been there for nearly an hour when a figure stepped out of the shadows, heading towards the seat. It uttered an "oh," of surprise when they realised there was already someone there.

He recognised the lilting voice. "Leia?"

"Luke?" Leia frowned.

The boy stood up. "I…um, would, would you like to join me?"

The princess smiled and sat with smoothness and regality. "It's very late, Luke, what are you doing here?" Then she laughed, "although I guess I haven't got room to say that if I am also here too."

He looked away, he didn't want to tell anyone, but she could draw secrets from his soul with just a single smile. "I was…I was thinking about my aunt and uncle, and about Ben." Somewhere in the distance a night bird called.

Leia bowed her head, "I'm sorry. I…know how you feel."

Luke met her eyes; "you must miss your father and home very much."

She nodded. "I do."

"Sometimes…" he trailed off.

When he didn't answer, she prompted him. "Sometimes you think this feeling will never go away?"

She saw the look of surprise on his face. "Yes." He frowned, "how did you know?"

She didn't know why she'd known, perhaps it was because she was grieving too, she reasoned. Leia looked into his eyes. "Maybe…" she replied quietly, "maybe it's because I feel like I've known you all my life."

He brushed a stray lock of hair behind her ear. "Leia…" he whispered.

"Shh…" she murmured and leant her face into his, her lips touched his, encouraging him to move his own slowly in time with hers, deepening the kiss. He laid her back on the bench, their bodies curled around each other's, pressing so close she could feel his arousal. It spurred her on, making her hands more adventurous. Skin flowed against skin.

"Oh!"

They both gasped and drew back from each other. A very embarrassed Mellenite stood shuffling his webbed feet. Luke hurried to his feet, blushing. Leia followed his lead, but with far more dignity.

"We…um…" stammered Luke.

"Were just leaving." Finished Leia with all the manners of a princess. "Good night, Luke."

"Er, um, yeah, good night, Leia."

She smiled in return and walked serenely out of the garden, nodding politely to the Mellenite as she passed him. "Commander Yinna."

******

That was a big mistake. It was the last thing she'd thought before she fell asleep, and the first thing she thought when she'd awoken. It had felt wrong even as they'd kissed, but wrong in a good way, like the heat of desire in a forbidden moment.

Leia stood in front of the mirror, wondering how she would go about explaining to Luke she'd been caught up in the moment, that their heated kisses wasn't the start of something between them. She'd plaited and re-plaited her long hair into something more practical as she turned the events of last night over and over in her head.

She wished she could change what had happened, she wished she could love Luke the way he wanted…she wished she had the courage to crop her hair short, but her father had loved it long. Cutting it would seem like cutting what little she had left of him from her life.

She had to tell him.

And she would.

Faint light had begun to filter into the hut, Leia noticed with relief. Dawn had finally arrived. She'd spent the long night tossing in the little bed Wicket had shown her too. And this time it wasn't the rough weave of the mattress or the slight muskyness of the furs that had kept her awake.

It was her memories.

Thoughts of another time, another place.

Things made sense now. Feelings made sense.

And made her feel sick to her stomach and want to scream of the unfairness of it all. She slipped out of the bed and wrapped a fur around her shoulders before quietly leaving the hut.

The Ewok village spanned out for miles, circling the tree trunks and linking them. It delighted the little girl in her. She would have loved a tree house as a child.

"What is it?"

Leia jumped at the sudden voice. It was Han. "Nothing,"

"It's not nothing. C'mon, Leia, I know you too well." He said, "you've been moping over something since the celebrations ended."

Few people had failed to notice the sudden change in Leia, from elation at the destruction of the Empire to the depths of despair. And for no apparent reason.

They didn't know that the consequences of Luke's revelation that they were twins had just hit her. "Its…I mean, there's not much you can do."

"I can listen."

Silence.

"Tell me what it is…." He demanded then softened his tone, "please?" She couldn't speak the words, he realised, he would have to feel in the dark and hope he hit paydirt. "Is it me?"

"No," she shook her head and just so he believed her, gave his cheek a quick kiss.

"Is it…?" he trailed off and yesterday's admission rose in his mind. He's my brother! "It's Luke?"

The sharp breath she drew confirmed it.

"It's about this brother thing?"

She and Luke had said little about it, as much from lack of any information to give as lack of time in which to tell it. But it just seemed right that they were twins and he'd excepted it without question.

"Do…do you think it's a lie?"

Leia shook her head firmly, "no. No, it's the truth. I…" she closed her eyes to listen to the inner sense, "I can feel it."

"Then that's good, right? Something to celebrate. Leia, you should be…I don't know what you should be, but you shouldn't be sad about it."

"I'm not!" She snapped.

"Then what?!"

"I kissed him! I…I touched him!" She screamed, "I've even dreamt we-" she pressed her fingers to her mouth as if to hold back the bile she felt rising in the back of her throat.

"Leia…"

"But that…the worse thing is I…I enjoyed it." The words felt as though they were ripped from her, "it made me….aroused." The last word was just a strangled sob. Han folded her into his arms and just let her cry.

"Do you have any idea what that makes me feel like?" She wept.

He didn't know. He didn't know anything, not when it came to Leia. But he did know one thing. He knew that he loved her. So he just smoothed her hair and rubbed her back and simply let her cry. It needed to come out. She had to move on.

She pulled back, wiping hot sticky tears from her cheeks. "I'm so scared, Han. I just want to be by Luke's side, be a sister to him…"

Han held her shoulders, "you will, Leia. You are!"

"Right now I don't think I can bear to see him again…or touch him again…." She sobbed. "Or look at him…"

He wanted nothing more than to fold her into his arms where nobody could hurt her and keep the pain away forever. But that would not help her. Not in the end.

Han let his hands fall away, it was the hardest thing he'd ever done. "Go…" he murmured, "go and see Luke, go be his sister."

The pyre he'd made for his father's body the day before was just smouldering ashes now, giving out a slight warming glow to keep away the bitter morning cold. Luke shivered. He'd thought he'd find comfort here, at his father's final resting-place. But he hadn't.

There were images in his head that no one could ever take away. Knowledge that filled him with loathing for himself. He and his sister….his sister, had touched in a way no siblings should.

He had touched himself, thinking of her, of making love to her, on many nights in the months after they'd met. When he'd been a boy, a teenager in love.

His SISTER.

He could still taste her mouth on his. Still feel her.

Ben had known all along. Knew in the heat of Tattooine's day as he wove his web of lies about Luke's father. Knew even as he watched Luke dumbstuck by the beauty of the princess in the holo-message.

"Why, Ben?" He asked aloud, "why let this happen? You must have known it could."

Perhaps the old Jedi had just hoped everything would remain secret. That Luke and Leia would just live there lives as friends and never discover the truth.

Which was every bit as terrible as what was happening now.

But it was all past now. There was only the future.

And facing up to consequences.

"What are we going to tell everyone?" Leia asked as she stepped into Luke's hut.

Luke looked up from his mediations but found he couldn't look directly at her. He didn't need to ask what she talking about. "The truth." He said.

She opened her mouth to object.

"…But not now." He finished. "There'd be…complications."

"There are too many already." She looked down at her feet. "Someone once told me that just looking at us you could tell we were going to be a set." She smiled wistfully at the memory. "I guess she got it half right." Then bitterness filled her face; "she'll laugh when she hears this. They all will. Laugh or worse…"

"Leia…" he began.

"Doesn't it bother you? We almost-" she shuddered. "I just want to be sick."

"I know." He said quietly.

She turned back to him, saw the quick dart of his eyes away from hers. He couldn't look her in the eyes anymore.

He had just as much right to feel this way as her. It was not his fault. It wasn't either of their faults. They were just two children born into a world of lies and deceit.

"Luke, look at me."

He bent his head.

"Look at me!"

"I can't." He whispered.

"Please, Luke, look at me."

He was afraid. Afraid of what he'd see there. Anger…disgust. He loved her too much to bear knowing that she hated him.

Leia reached out in a slender finger and gently placed it beneath his chin. Then she raised his face to look at hers. Their eyes met.

Luke stared into her brown eyes and the fear slowed ebbed. There was no loathing there. Nothing but love…pure unconditional love…and the tiny reflection of his own face.

And Leia felt a sense of relief flood over her. She hadn't flinched at her brother's gaze. Hadn't given a second thought to touching him.

My brother, she thought.

And it was one of joy.