Warlock of Yavin

[Ashin Varanin]

Sure, I guess I know a couple stories about Ember Rekali.

They say he’s what folks call the Old Guard, the dozens of men and women that got pulled to now from the Empire’s time, one way or another. Some came by carbonite or oubliette; some just lived that long. Ol’ Ember had a passel of knowledge from the Aing-Tii, by way of his son Rach and daughter Benna, but second-hand’s not good enough when you’re messing with time. Well, there’s a place – I ain’t saying it’s the Tyus Cluster, but I ain’t saying it’s not – where time runs wrong. Runs too fast, more like, so you could wander through taking a nap and come out the other side a hundred years on, with all your friends dead and your dreams gone obsolete. That’s what happened to the Rekali family. Half-Vahla, it’s said, though whether he’s pure and his wife was pure human, or whether they were both half and made their kids two-quarter-blood – mate, who knows. I’m just talking.

He started out wrong, born under a bad sign you might say. The stories are all old as feth: him being a Nightsister’s servant, learnin’ her art, winning his freedom. They say it might’ve been the same that Rave Merrill was a clone of. They say that’s where he met his wife and this other girl, and that other girl got with child, but that’s another story. They say he an’ his wife trained at a place called the Twilight Praxeum with a metric fethton of other kids, some abducted. They say those kids killed their teachers and showed some warlords what for. At some point in there, Ember signed on with a Jedi that was on his way to ke’dem, and as Lyn-Char Beorht went Dark, Ember went Light, so they never quite saw eye to eye no matter when. There was crusades, aye, near Tion and all that. Some say there was terrorist things, all against Darksiders.

 

[Ashin Varanin]

When Beorht died, Ember went a-wanderin’. He fell in with better souls, more or less: Draethos Keetael, Fallanassi, some others. ‘Ventually he found what passed for the Jedi in that day and age, settled down and raised a bevy o’kids.

His wife, now, she was a powerful beauty. Her face is plastered all over the verse, you’ve seen it a dozen times: it was her genes that the Fringe used to make their clone pilots and walker crews and intel officers, on account of her being an old friend of Ashin Varanin. Brembla Kol-Rekali, or Kol as she was known. She flew a black X-Wing, and she once took a wrong turn on a cold-shirt crossing while a star destroyer was detonatin’ around her, and wound up with more’n half her body replaced with droid bits. Still a powerful beauty, though, even mostly cyborg.

 

[Ashin Varanin]

Then there’s his son Rach, and boy, if you’re a Mando you’d have to have lived under a rock not to hear of Rach Kol-Rekali. Fether went on the Sojourn expedition and walked with the Aing-Tii until he could see time, better at it than his pappy ever was. Rach talked his way out of his own kidnapping and torture once, and bought the freedom of Alliera, his girl. Maybe you’d know her better as Mandalore of the Pale Blade, she that came after the Bear and before Monroe. Ori’alor Tal’verda – that’s how she’s known now, though she keeps her head down. But Rach was a hot-blooded man, and while their daughter Alec was young, he left his daddy’s stronghold on Ossus an’ got himself kicked out of the Jedi Order. Got his Knighthood revoked, an’ that takes some doing.

They say Rach seduced Kamon Vondiranach’s bride at their wedding on Eshan. They say he got his shebs handed to him by Sarge Potteiger but still managed to squeak out a victory. They say he slept with Anaya gorram Fen and then tried taking her in for a bounty. They say he was Velok’s pilot, and the old Whiphid bound his soul to a Hutt’s body for a spell. So to speak. They say a lotta things about Rach, Ember’s oldest boy, but what it all comes down to is this. He joined the Mandos for his wife, helped’em conquer all manner of worlds, and was reckoned a Master of the Dark Side when the Sith Empire invaded Mandalore. And that’s when he ate a tactical nuke just outside Keldabe. His voice stuck around, guidin’ the living for years after that. Bit of a dick, between you and me, and he broke his pappy’s heart so many times it never healed right.

‘Course, they also say Rach was cursed. He didn’t get away scot-free on that kidnap, no sir. He got the dark arts drilled into his skull along with all his mama’s memories, for the Sith that got him was the same that got her. What’s a man to do after a thing like that? What’s his daddy to do?

 

[Ashin Varanin]

The younger boys, Certh and Faran, I hear tell they were decent kids. Faran died on Ossus an’ his daddy buried him there. Certh was a Jedi Knight, him and his little sister Benna, an’ they both died when the Republic took Metalorn, around the same time Ember stopped bein’ the Jedi Council’s wetwork man. One more heartbreak for the old man, three little bodies that the Sith cut down. So you can start to see a pattern.

That just left the bastard: Aaralyn. The angry one. Sword of the Jedi, the one as came after Jaxton Ravos. Well, she and her pappy never did see eye to eye, no more than he ever did with his Masters. And there was clanfolks, Elijah, Vesta, his granddaughter Alec an’ all the rest – Shardrock Clan, that’s Ember’s clan from Dathomir, plus all his Vahla cousins that stuck with him, plus the Mandos that had followed his son an’ daughter-in-law. So you can see how he had a lotta folks to call family, but not a soul of the core unit save Aaralyn. Well, the One Sith got her and warped her mind, made a Darth of her, and that just about finished him.

He was building the family legacy ‘round then, tryin’ to raise Alec when her mama pawned her off for not knowing how to deal with her. He was a bounty hunter too, the kind that took bounties on space stations and artificial moons and Masters of whatever stripe. They say he’s the one that captured Anaya Fen, Emperor Voracitos, Talon Vosra, Jared Ovmar, and a passel of others. One-man boarding crew specializing in command ships. Took all the mutt bits of his skillset and made a lump out of’em, and boy was it a lump and a half. I’m talking every tracking and strength enhancement technique in any serious Force tradition there is, plus that Fallanassi knack for disappearing. He’s the one that trained Ordo, the Ordo, and the two of’em’d just walk around carrying starship-scale automatic weapons an’ arm-wrestling bull rancors. So you can sorta see why when the dam finally broke, it broke hard.

 

[Ashin Varanin]

Well, he went on a one-man crusade. Gotta remember, too, this is the guy that tore down the Sith Empire’s palace on Dromund Kaas by himself during the invasion. This is the guy whose fleet hit Mon Calamari to save the lives of pretty much everyone that’s ever called themselves Mandalore in the modern times – I’m talking Monroe, Gil Skirata, the lot of’em were like fish in a barrel and he pulled’em out by his lonesome. This is the guy that helped found the CIS and trained plenty of their heavy hitters. This is the guy that punched through the wall of the Sith Council’s holocron vault and Force Lighted what was in there to sparkly dust. He’s beat the feth out of the New Order too, once or twice, and fought six Sith at the same time. This guy was a Field Marshal, one of the old crowd, a peer to Strider Garon and Skirata. He’d taught Ordo, and when the fether turned out to be the Dark Lord of the One Sith, Ember’s the one that tackled him on Coruscant when the Starfall came down. Trained Anija Ordo too, I hear, and a few others; he’s the one that first started teaching modern Mandos how to use the Force like a can opener.

I ain’t listing all that to tell you he’s all that, mind. I’m saying it to tell you he was just as tired as he was heartbroken. Getting old, too. Vahla live a while, but he’s only half. Old an’ lonely, an’ his last kid’s been mindfrakked. So what does he do but take the fight to the One Sith with a vengeance. He an’ this bounty hunter named Skye Mertaal got the inside track and started snaring prisoners outta the Deep Core, we’re talking One Sith heartland, even back then. They say he’s the one that got Kira Talith, only she was Kira Liadain then, and the whole Talith clan owes him a life debt. Nobody knows what happened when he finally tracked down his kid Aaralyn, but it’s for sure they fought, just one old man against the Sword of the Jedi. And her with killer instinct and him with none of that, not towards her. But he won, maybe with Mertaal’s help, maybe alone. Next thing you know, the Jedi have their Sword back and the One Sith are down a Darth.

 

[Ashin Varanin]

That’s when he retired, or started building for real. His clan already ran the Yavin system, plus a place on Dathomir and a couple bits on Vjun. He hung up his armour and started taking clan father business more serious. It was his granddaughter Alec that evicted the Order of the Grey from Yavin Four, and represented him at clan councils. He’s still a Field Marshal, topmost of the top, and that’s an honour not handed out too often, but he’s retired from that as well. Some run into him at Port Shardrock, beside the Jedi Academy, and he’s the one that owns the lot, though he’s a better landlord to the Jedi than he was to the Grays. The Warlock of Yavin, he’s called. Aliit’buir Rekali, running the clan from some buried hideyhole, keeping the catalog of the Mandos’ Force artifacts from when they sacked and excavated Dromund Kaas.

He’s popped his head up once or twice since then. One time there was a dar’manda Forcer got brought to Myrkr, and in walks Rekali – I heard this from someone on the dar’manda’s crew – and says he’ll release him scot-free if he eats this pill. So the fether eats it, and it’s poison that makes you near die of pain if you use the Dark Side. That’s the kind of stunt Rekali pulls when he takes something personal.

 

[Ashin Varanin]

The one time he really came out of retirement that I know of, he goes to Coruscant, right into the belly of the beast. In just a shirt and pants, with no weapons or gear or nothing, he gets inside two ultra-high-security facilities, leads the troops an’ systems on a merry chase, and beats the snot out of an armed Sith Master on home turf. That’s the one time I know of, mind. If anything’s for sure about Ember gorram Rekali, it’s that when the moment calls for it and family’s at stake, the old guy moves too fast to see.

What can he do? Well, it’s like I said. He’s trained with a little bit of everyone, but he sort of pulled it all together. He’s strong and fast, a climber and a runner. He can carry these massive weapons and kick through walls, and when he busts out his hookblades, that’s when it gets nasty. He can go off the grid so hard there’s no droid or sensor can spot him, so hard you wouldn’t see him if he was standing in front of you pointing a gun at your face. That’s the bulk of it: strong as a gundark, and invisible. Plus he’s got this trick of seeing the past, the Aing-Tii monks’ thing. That’s embarrassed more than a few, I can tell you that.

So why you asking about Ember Rekali in the first place? I suppose I could hazard a guess. See, he’s trusted the Yavin Jedi to look after the Praxeum they’re borrowing from his clan, but now Eyal M’ti’s getting old and Shule Windspeaker’s gone who-knows-where. They kept people away, kept up their end of things. He thinks he’s got to step up his game, that’s my bet. Pop some pain stims, stop moping, and hope his armor still fits.

 

[Ashin Varanin]

YAVIN IV
JEDI ACADEMY
REKALI TERRITORY

“I’m just sorry it took this long to figure out.”

“Ember…” The blonde man – far younger, and infinitely older – scratched his scalp, ruffling his floppy hair. It didn’t do much for the gravitas of the moment. “At some level, I’ve always known. I’ve railed against this curse, but I just didn’t want to let go.”

“But you do now. After…seven hundred years, is it?”

“My story’s ended, and restarted, and ended again, over and over. I’ve been dragged back to life for so many second chances, and I’ve failed all of them. I’m a killer, Ember. By any empirical standard I’ve got more blood on my hands than any Jedi in history. I can’t keep pretending I’m anything else. I’m tired, and the distractions don’t work anymore.”

Ember gestured around at the Yavin temples, the jungle. “You’ve changed lives here. Don’t sell yourself short.”

“A drop in the bucket compared to the pain I’ve caused. And will cause, unless I stop fighting it, at every level, and let you do what needs to be done.”

 

[Ashin Varanin]

“Are you sure it’ll work?”

“I’ve tried everything else. I went to the Five and they wouldn’t have me. I took a swan dive into a black hole two centuries back – nothing. I even died on Myrkr once, and woke up as a mynock once the planet moved past that spot in its orbit. But I’ve never asked for someone to do this, not this way. I told myself it wouldn’t work, for so long that I forgot it was an option, and I just kept on railing at my senseless lives. This is doom, Ember. This is damnation. Repeating your sins over and over again, condemning yourself more and more. It’s time for me to admit that I’ve failed to practice what I preached.”

The blonde man seemed to fold in on himself as he sighed. He took a seat on a stone bench, in the shadow of the forest. Their conversation had led them all the way through the temple complex, and Ember hadn’t even been aware until now. Shule gestured at the bench beside him, and Ember took the seat with a nod.

 

[Ashin Varanin]

“You’ve made progress. I hear the last you was far worse.”

“Je’gan, yes. But the Je’gan before that was better, and the one before that; I’ve been trending downward for centuries. There’s a kernel of dark in my heart that I’ve never bothered to uproot. This life may strike you as an improvement, but in this life I’ve wiped the minds of the innocent and killed armies alone. Thousands upon thousands of dead at Kashyyyk.”

“Yuuzhan Vong warriors.”

“People. And it meant no more to me-”

“Then why did you mourn and meditate for so long afterward, Shule?”

“Because I felt like I should. These Jedi Councils and Masters, Ember…they’re fools as often as not, petty, venial fools, but that’s only because they’re children. They’re not so set in their ways as I am. Their sins aren’t as ingrained or as serious as mine.”

“If you say so.”

 

[Ashin Varanin]

Shule rested his elbows on his knees, scarred hands dangling. “It’s not even the lives I’ve lived that gets to me,” he said quietly. “It’s the lives unlived. Every time I wake up in possession of another body, willing or unwilling, aware or not, that’s a whole life just gone. I’ve been everything, Ember. Man, woman, boy, girl, humanoid, alien, plant, animal, incorporeal spirit, holocron in a drawer. And all of those men and women and aliens and creatures had a life ahead of them before I came along. How can I justify that to myself, once I acknowledge that I know how to end my life permanently? How can I claim to be a Jedi, let alone a teacher? A Grandmaster? There’s rot at the heart of me. I’ve tried to burn it out with every bit of courage and love I can muster, but it’s there, that bit of monstrous selfishness. That’s why the Five refused me: there’s a point in their training when their students fight their own failings, and move past them. But I can’t move past mine. I need help, Ember. I need it. I can’t take another body from someone, I can’t live another life, I can’t kill anymore and I can’t watch my friends and wives and children grow old and die anymore.”

Ember worked up a wad and spat into the jungle undergrowth around the base of the bench. “You convinced yourself yet?”

“Yes. But I know myself. I know I won’t stay convinced. Immortality may be a curse, but it’s an addictive one. That’s why you need to do it now, before I change my mind.”

 

[Ashin Varanin]

With a grunt, Ember half-stood again, massaging his knees. “I’m going to regret this.”

“This is going to be your greatest act of mercy. On me, and on whoever or whatever was next to die because of me.”

Ember stumped around the bench to stand behind the seated Jedi Grandmaster. “Name?”

Shule remained facing the Academy. “You know I’d forgotten my birth name? I remembered it the other day. Nash Katren. Very lower-class Varundana name. When I was still young, I took the name Je’gan Olra’en as an alias going into the Sith, based on the name of a good friend. Then there was Seren Irreantum, and Darth Shule the Sith Lord, and Je’gan Black Eyes, and all sorts of names in between. And then Grandmaster Je’gan Olra’an again, and now Shule Windspeaker, and I’m tired of being so many things, Ember. I’m tired of being. Does that make sense?”

“You’re full. Full of regrets and emotions and memories and legacies and angst. And I get that, I do.” Ember massaged the bridge of his nose between thumb and forefinger in a fruitless attempt to stave off a headache. “What you want is silence.”

“I want to be one with the Force. I don’t even want to retain my identity; what good has it ever done?”

 

[Ashin Varanin]

Ember thought of a wife or two, and descendants, and students, but in the end he wasn’t about to start talking Shule out of this. “So I guess what I’m asking is, what name do you want to be yours, the last time?”

Shule sat up straight, so Ember could rest a hand on his head. “Nash, I think. Nash Katren was a good boy. Ambitious, brash, but content to be second fiddle to his friends. Nash never killed with malice or self-righteousness in his heart, and he didn’t know a thing about the Force, even as a Jedi student. After seven centuries, I think I’d like to be Nash again.”

Ember nodded and sighed. Force, but he felt like he was taking a sick striil out behind the barn with a scattergun. “All right then, son. All right then.”

Force Light exploded from his hand, too bright to look at, glowing pink through his eyelids. The light permeated Shule’s body, starting at the scalp. It met no resistance from the Jedi Master’s physical body, but it stripped away layers of illusion and shielding, consciously or unconsciously wrought. Shule was letting them go, letting his defenses lapse. And woven through the core of Shule’s soul, Ember found resistance at last: a braided knot of selfish old evil. A curse forged by an arrogant young Sith Lord, a master mentalist who’d thought he’d found a means of immortality. Ember’s Force Light chewed into the knot, surrounded it, bathed it.

“Let go, son. You were right. It’s time.”

Shule gave a shuddering gasp and the knot exploded across Ember’s mind’s eye. The fragments slowed, caught in the torrent of light, and melted away. “Tahira,” the corpsetaker mumbled, and slid off the bench. Knees protesting, Ember sat again, light still rushing from his palm to surround the body. Something tiny and venal shrieked in the back of his mind and was gone. Padawans and clanspeople were running, thinking they could help. Ember closed his eyes again and thought of better days.

 

[Ashin Varanin]

Later, at the pyre, Headmaster M’ti gave Shule’s simple eulogy. Ember Rekali stayed in the back, but he’d dressed like a Jedi for the occasion – first time in many years. His lightsabre, long missing, was absent. He wore a set of simple burlap robes, like the ones he’d worn as a Jedi Council member when the world was flat; he’d found them in the Lost City during its secret renovations. He’d spent a while there between death and funeral, tracing the dead man’s history through holocron accounts. It felt like the thing to do: to let Je’gan Olra’en’s long career be remembered as a cautionary tale, at least as a caution to him. He wasn’t sure yet whether to share the story, or explain what had happened. All the Jedi had seen or sensed was a torrent of Force Light, and then Shule had died. Some said he’d been a Sith infiltrator; Ember had denied that, though it cut uncomfortably close to the quick of Shule’s fundamental hypocrisy.

Others should have been here. Family, friends. But those had been Je’gan’s people, if any were still alive. And Shule Windspeaker had been, in many ways, a stranger to everyone. This was nothing but a brief interruption to the Academy’s operation. An interlude, no more. The students would accept new teachers in his place, remember him with a vague pang, and go on with their careers. Like Shule, they had themselves on their minds.

 

[Ashin Varanin]

After the funeral, Ember folded the robes and put them away still smelling of the pyre.

“You’re back?” That was Alec, Rach’s daughter, the pride of Ember’s old age, legs sticking out of a crawlspace. The Lost City of the Jedi – the final secret of the core Rekali family – had been renovated for years, but any place this old needed maintenance. Alec shoved out her toolbox and emerged, face spotted with grime and oil. She looked up at Ember where he stood in the doorway, leaning on the frame. “How was it?”

“Sad,” he said. “But not all sad.”

“Standard Jedi funeral?” She was clearly humoring him, counting time until she could get back to whatever bit of mechanism needed her attention.

“More or less. A good reminder of why I left. How’s it possible to live for others and really be living for yourself? How does that turn into a whole culture?”

“Hm?”

He shook his head. “Ignore me. I don’t really have the words for it.”

Alec shrugged and slid back into the crawlspace until only her boots protruded. “Let me know when you find’em, Grandpa,” she said, voice muffled by the wall. “Or if you need to talk or whatever.”

“Thanks, Alec. You’re a good kid. Good kid…” He muffled a yawn with the back of his fist and headed back the way he’d come. He’d traded his robes for your average under-armor Mando jumpsuit, his standard wear. Good for fixing up the subterranean Lost City, good for walking through the jungle far overhead.

 

[Ashin Varanin]

As he went back into his little bedroom, though, he closed the door and stripped off the jumpsuit. He replaced it with one that a layman would have called identical, but this was a power armor liner, high-end gear. He snugged that into place, checked the power readouts – this undersuit could generate a torso energy field and shrug off a chemical attack – then sat down on the foot of his bed. After a long moment, he gestured and a tall closet opened, revealing a suit of armour.

Pieces of beskar began to float off the rack and buckle themselves to his body, a telekinesis exercise he’d once done daily. He fumbled it a little; it cost him to split his focus so many ways, and he was, admittedly, a bit rusty. He could let go of some as they buckled and fastened to each other, plate on overlapping plate, snug around the midsection. The helmet came last, a mask fashioned from Dathomiri and Keetael symbology, with only the faintest aesthetic suggestion of a Mandalorion T-visor. He settled the helmet over his head, and half a dozen subtle overlays snapped to life. Still sitting on the end of the bed, he twisted his wrists just right, and beskar Thorns of Ryloth snapped out past his knuckles. The long hookblades still bore a razor edge. He twisted his hands again, and the hookblades retracted between one heartbeat and the next.

“Can’t just live for yourself, I guess. No, sir.”

 

[Ashin Varanin]

Alec clambered out of the crawlspace again as he approached. “Dang, Grandpa, you’ve suited up. Looks good.”

“It’s that kind of a day. Alec, remind me what you thought of Gilamar’s meeting.”

“Herding cats. Tale as old as time.” She got to her feet, wiping grease on her coveralls. “I forgot to mention: Ijaat Akun’s back, so there’s that. He wants to set up a beskar forge here on Yavin, and I gave him the go-ahead.”

“That’s the best news I’ve had all day.” Ember’s armor left his hands bare; he grabbed his chest and belly plates, and adjusted them manually until he found a slightly more comfortable fit. “Was Ordo there?”

“No, Anija spoke for the clan.”

“I should visit her one of these days. Is she still with Mandal Hypernautics?”

“Running the place, far as I know.” A slow grin broke over Alec’s face. “You getting back in the game, Grandpa?”

“Dipping my feet in the water, let’s say. I just spent an afternoon with a man who couldn’t think about anyone’s problems but his, and it struck me that I’ve been guilty of the same thing. I feel good today.”

 

[Ashin Varanin]

“Glad to hear it.” She pointed down the hall. “I’ve got some reports to go through. Was putting off doing your exec summary. Want to dig into the raw data with me?”

“I’d like that.” He followed her, beskar boots grating on stone. “You’ve been the next best thing to aliit’buir yourself sometimes, Alec. I want you to know I’m grateful for that.”

“Yeah, well, you won’t be shoving the title off on me anytime soon if I’ve got anything to say about it.” She entered the meeting room, which had never been used for a meeting, and touched the holoprojector controls. The files snapped to life above the table. They sat beside each other, Alec slouching in her coveralls, Ember doing his level best to remember to sit up straight in full beskar’kandar.

“Havod production’s up,” she said, “but the supply lines to Dathomir still aren’t great. There’s a reason that planet stayed hidden for centuries.”

“We might want to look into local sourcing. Your grandmother lost her life on a mining rig there, so there must be something worth excavating.”

“Turns out there is.” A new set of files came up. “Prospecting and seismic reports. Not amazing, but potentially worthwhile. It’s a decent source, and it’s close. We’d have to deal with the gravity well, of course. It’s a lot easier in space.”

 

[Ashin Varanin]

“What’s this recommendation here?” Ember squinted just right, and his helmet’s eyepieces zoomed in to 110%. “Infrastructure?”

“Just the one line, per proven mining site anyway. Nothing that would screw with the land too hard or piss off the other witch clans.”

Ember snorted. “Witches get up in arms over a whole lot of things, Alec. It’s sort of what we do.”

“What they don’t know won’t hurt’em.” Alec swiped the reports to the side, and yet another set took their place. “Intrasystem defenses. Actual, by clan and corporate affiliation, and proposed.”

“Proposed by who?”

“Cousin Vesta, before she disappeared again. She’s paranoid about, well, everything, but when she wrote this she was worried about the Vitality waking up, chomping its way out of the nebula, and consuming the sector. She seemed to think that turbolaser platforms might be in order. And…herbal charms. Let’s table that part of the report.”

“Vesta’s a special girl.” Ember rubbed at the back of his neck. “My question is, is Dathomir at risk?”

“Everything’s at risk.” Alec pulled up a galactic map. Primeval territory pulsed green-black, a tentacular mass twenty thousand light-years long. “Which is why I’ve got my doubts about holding back.”

 

[Ashin Varanin]

“We still don’t know what we’re dealing with out there. Remember, Vahl’s real, so’s the Vitality, and the Primeval worship beings on that scale. We just don’t know if theirs are imaginary or not. Gilamar was right to ask the clans to hold back for now. We need a better idea of what we’re fighting. What do you have for scout reports?”

“I, ah, did a quick run through the Chiloon Rift last week.”

“Alec…”

“I know, I know, but that’s my old stomping ground, and nobody in history’s ever come close to controlling all of it all the time. Not the Empire, not the Galactic Alliance, not megacorporations, nobody. It’s impossible. So I found some loopholes and took some readings, and it’s bad.”

“How bad?”

“Think Lords of the Fringe, but in our backyard. I don’t think the last defeat was a fluke. I think we’ve finally run up against someone more boneheaded than we are, and a heck of a lot more willing to work together. If we survive this, it’s going to be by sheer inertia.”

He pulled off his helmet and rubbed his face with his hands. “How many of their One Sith connections are confirmed?”

“None, not for any serious values of confirmation, but it’s common sense.”

“For now. The One Sith don’t have much patience for anything that’s not them, not in the long run. ‘One’ just means ‘everything but the Other’, after all.”