The Sweetest Taste

Chapter 6 - Bruises

Din watched as Lysa weaved easily between the stalls, buying ingredients here and there. Even bartering lightheartedly with the vendors.

At points she would turn to Din, who was lingering near to her, talking him through some of the rarer items being sold.

"Has Grogu tried these purple pears?" she said now, gracing him with a kind smile and holding out a curved purple fruit.

At her words, the Mandalorian gave a shake of his head. "I'm not sure," he murmured.

Din knew that his son had lived for fifty years before meeting him. He was certain there were a lot of things he had or hadn't done in that time, but none of that Din particularly wanted to dwell on.

Perhaps sensing his unease with the question, Lysa offered him a lingering look before turning back to the Snivvian stall holder.

"I'll take eight of those," she said gently, her eyes scanning over the fruit before her, pointing her finger at each item in turn. "And I'll take.....six of the Giva and three punnets of the tufted mushberries."

Item by item, the stall holder handed over the fruit which Lysa carefully placed into her basket. Before she extracted a handful of credits and held them out for the Snivvian.

But as she did so, the sleeve of her tunic slipped a little, revealing a large and nasty looking bright purple bruise on her forearm. It was blotchy and looked stark against her smooth skin.

Din instantly frowned.

He watched as Lysa thanked the stall holder before turning back to the Mandalorian, but her smile faltered as she saw him looking directly at her.

"What?" she asked curiously, her eyes roving across his beskar helmet.

Din allowed her to reach him before he turned, walking away with her at his side once again.

"Where'd you get a bruise like that?" he said before he could stop himself, pointing his gloved hand towards her now-covered forearm.

Din had been injured more times than he could count and knew what it was like to wake up with mark like that across his bruised limbs. Something that looked as bad as that did, you didn't just get from bumping it on a counter.

But beside him he felt Lysa visibly stop in her tracks. Din turned to her just in time to see her eyes widen and her cheeks turn white.

But he was lucky to have caught it, for within less than a second Lysa had righted herself. As though a veil had fallen down over her features, shielding her visible emotions to the world- similar to what Din's helmet did for him.

"Oh this thing?," she said brightly, tapping her finger over her sleeve, but she made no move to uncover the bruise again. "Oh it's nothing. I just knocked it getting out of the speeder yesterday."

Din frowned, narrowing his eyes in her direction.

The Mandalorian had interrogated many people during his lifetime. He knew when someone was lying.

But was it his place to argue with her?

Din knew that at this stage he valued his friendship with her too much to question her.

That was what this was, wasn't it? A friendship?

And so Din remained silent. Not saying another word on the subject.

For a moment he felt Lysa glance towards him as they walked away from the hustle and bustle of the busy Bazaar.

"Din, I-"

But before Lysa could say another word, she was roughly shoved aside by a man running past, arms laden full of trinkets from a nearby stall.

"HEY, COME BACK HERE!" came the gruff voice of the Weequay market vendor, pointing at the man. "THIEF!"