Chapter 53 (Patreon)

Cramped, the ancient gifted thought yet again, taking a sip of fragrant decoction and setting aside a book from the ship’s library. These Dathomiri skins couldn’t endure the presence of her spirit inside them for long. But there were three of them, which gave XoXaan the ability to remain in the flesh almost around the clock.

Not that she made much use of it.

Cramped.

The clothes didn’t fit, so to speak, and the little foolish witch whimpering in terror at the back of her consciousness… was irritating.

“How utterly useless you are,” the Lady growled in frustration as she abandoned her temporary shell. “Put your sister on the bunk.”

The two Dathomiri women kneeling in the corner of her cabin immediately jumped to their feet and dragged the unconscious body of the third over to the bed.

At first, what infuriated the Sith Lady most was that she couldn’t simply knock those fools out of their own bodies and use the shells without the unnecessary passengers. Not that she lacked the power to do it, but the witches were someone else’s property. Even that wouldn’t have stopped XoXaan, if not for the identity of their owner. At first, that had been the only reason—an extremely irritating one.

But after only a couple of days, the Lady had found certain advantages as well—or rather, remembered what it had been like to be a living gifted. First and foremost, the witches could take care of themselves. Keep the bodies clean and fed. Second: servants were convenient. She didn’t appreciate the sorcerer dumping his “rejects” on her, but in his place she would have done exactly the same. There was no making apprentices out of this trash, but given a couple of months, it might be possible to mold them into something halfway presentable that resembled proper servants. At the very least, the idiots were trainable.

Once the support staff had been given the right tasks, there would be no need to waste time on trivialities. And besides… they occasionally amused her. Their fear was so entertaining that, purely for fun, the Sith Lady would sometimes spend several minutes simply staring at the three witches with the heavy gaze of a Force ghost. And whenever she once again decided to sample some food or drink while occupying the body of one of the Nightsisters, XoXaan would make the other two tell her about their life in the Clan.

The Nightsister Clan was quite an amusing place. A couple of times, she hadn’t even been able to hold back her laughter. Some savage parody of their Order, mixed with primitive witchcraft and rabid matriarchy. And Talzin, their so-called Mother, was quite the schemer herself. From the stories told by her former daughters, she seemed powerful enough, and their memories made it clear she was more than just some savage witch. Of course, comparing her to XoXaan would be ridiculous, but to the Sith alive today… mmm… She would have to find out exactly how things stood with them now. Bane would have ground that girl into dust as well, and the Muun Plagueis hadn’t been bad either…

A pity she had stopped keeping an eye on events about fifty years ago, once again sinking into something resembling sleep inside the holocron. Boring… Watching the rats scurry about was only entertaining when something was actually happening; otherwise it was all backstage maneuvering, intrigues, and underhanded little schemes. No matter what her reason told her, deep down she despised those who now called themselves Sith. Sneaks. Not that XoXaan herself was above a good old-fashioned covert intrigue now and then—preferably one with another couple of intrigues nested inside it—but living like that all the time? Where was the Power? Where was the Strength? Where was the Freedom? Where were the Fear and Respect of everyone around them?

Only a handful of close servants, groveling before the Baneites who had deigned to reveal themselves. Small-time. Incredibly small-time! When she had been alive, the populations of planets… no! The populations of entire star systems had spoken her Name with terror and reverence! For a scrap of her knowledge, they had been willing to surrender everything they possessed, and for the honor of becoming her apprentices, they had fought to the death! Her words had been listened to with awe, and her commands had carried the weight of the will of Gods!

Gods…

If XoXaan had been inside one of the witches right now, those recent memories would probably have taken her breath away.

It had all started rather unusually. A pity she hadn’t noticed the intrusion from the very beginning, but after the guardian was discorporated for the fifth time, XoXaan fully “awakened” and decided to find out what exactly was going on.

And what was going on turned out to be interesting.

And slightly embarrassing for her.

An unusual gifted, brazenly wandering through the Lady’s domain, was effortlessly holding his own against the pseudo-sentient guardian.

But what made him interesting wasn’t how easily the stranger held off something resembling a Force ghost, or even the fact that the Force emanating from the red-eyed man—who outwardly looked so much like her fellow members of the Order—felt somehow strange, unfamiliar.

The problem was that he… wasn’t supposed to be here.

XoXaan hadn’t been languishing in a tomb beneath the temple for no reason—she had been waiting. Waiting for someone who served the Light and came to understand that the Light Side was meaningless. Someone who decided that Light itself was a flaw in the galaxy. Someone who had known anger, hatred, and despair! A Jedi ready to open himself to the Darkness!

In the Darkness, she had seen much. The end—but not the final end—of her life. The war between her former Order and her current one. Victories and defeats. How both sides gathered their strength, how worlds burned in their struggle. She had seen the shadows of the greatest heroes and the most extraordinary villains. Thousands of years of the great war between Light and Darkness, a war that would never end. And she had also seen the place and time where her holocron had to be so that it would be found by the one who would once again carry her name across the entire galaxy!

While she waited for her Chosen One, the future Emperor, thousands of sentients would visit the magnificent temple beneath which her tomb was hidden. Gifted and ungifted alike. Each would have their own encounter.

Some would find nothing but dusty desolation, without so much as a spark of her power. Only the pressure of Korriban’s Dark Side would hint that this place had once glowed with dark light. Getting involved with those “visitors” would be dangerous, so they would find exactly… nothing.

Some she would toy with personally—those no one would come looking for, but who might provide her with a little entertainment and brighten the millennia of waiting.

As for the majority—the talentless, the boring, the dreary, those who had nothing remotely interesting about them… For them, she had created the guardian. She could, of course, have simply ignored them, but while those who posed a threat to XoXaan’s plan could still be tolerated, insects crawling through her domain, trampling ground that in her lifetime one had to earn the right to walk upon… insects needed to be crushed.

The guardian had taken the man in the black robe for exactly that kind of insect. Nothing could be sensed from him at all. No life, as from an organic being, no energy, as from a droid… and at first, not even the slightest trace of the Force. He could only be seen.

XoXaan was irritated. It was unpleasant to watch her own creation not merely fail, but embarrass her in the process—screeching hideously and doing utter nonsense. No, rationally she understood that the guardian simply couldn’t decide how to respond to such an unconventional target, but that didn’t make the spectacle any less irritating.

But alongside the irritation came something the ancient Dark gifted had almost forgotten over the many centuries spent inside the holocron: curiosity. The sentient she could not sense—most likely concealed by some Force technique—was freely using Force constructs completely unfamiliar to XoXaan. Something incomprehensible, strange… new! Something capable of effortlessly holding back the guardian’s attacks. It intrigued her so much that the gifted decided to look into the red-eyed man’s past and future.

That sort of thing did not always provide clear or precise information, especially when done spontaneously and without preparation, but it would at least allow her to learn, in broad strokes, what sort of “guest” had come to her.

The Lady was astonished to find herself unable to make out anything coherent at all! Blurred patches, incomprehensible shadows blacker than darkness itself, within which she could barely distinguish the lean, four-legged silhouettes of some unknown animals. A vague image of something vast as a world, yet resembling a shelled amphibian. Then an endless rain of black droplets, hiding everything around it. The fate of the man walking through the temple complex corridors, effortlessly defending himself against the guardian… it was as though something so immensely powerful had concealed it that even the gaze of an ancient gifted—one of those who had become the first Sith Lords—could not pierce the protection and could glimpse only pathetic scraps.

The situation was anything but straightforward. She found it difficult to predict what might happen next. Attack him herself? That was certainly an option: XoXaan was almost certain she would win. Unfortunately, there were several “buts.” The first and most important was that if this sentient mattered, someone would come for him. They would search for him, and her refuge would be compromised. And she had a plan… Besides, that almost bothered her. The unfamiliar techniques, somewhat reminiscent of Sith sorcery, might hold unpleasant surprises, and XoXaan had never liked that sort of thing.

Second: those unfamiliar Force techniques. The Lady found them interesting, as well as whatever it was that prevented her from seeing the stranger’s past and future.

And third: judging by what had happened at the very beginning of his “introduction” to the guardian, the man hadn’t been opposed to talking. He had even been quite polite. And his smile was pleasant, almost disarming. It brought back memories of a couple of old “friends” she had killed while she was still alive.

Based on all of the above, XoXaan decided to begin with negotiations. She needed to learn more about her red-eyed guest first, and only then make any decisions.

That course of action—and everything that happened after she met Siith—had brought the Sith Lady nothing less than new prospects. Very exciting prospects, compelling enough for the gifted to abandon her long-term plan entirely. Why? Because the plan had ceased to be viable—and it was this very sentient who had made it so!

The problem was those very difficulties in reading his fate. The Force simply refused to provide anything coherent, and that same protection covered not only the sorcerer, as he called himself, but another witch from Dathomir as well—the one who had brought her three companions here. Unlike the red-eyed man she called Teacher, she was unquestionably a Dark gifted. Darkness rolled off her—nothing like XoXaan’s, of course; the girl was far too small a fish for that—but it was still unmistakable. And the smile and look she had cast after her “friends” as they headed into the tomb spoke volumes: malicious delight, mockery, contempt. The fact that she could be sensed, however, solved nothing. Her past and future were hidden behind nothing but a murky haze and those same fleeting shadows of four-legged beasts.

What could that mean for the future? A lone individual wrapped in such protection could already introduce a factor of uncertainty, but this Siith was the head of some Guild and the director of an Academy where others like him were being trained. Which meant the predictions XoXaan had been relying on were already unreliable—perhaps even outright false!

A large number of such “shielded” sentients scattered across the galaxy practically guaranteed the collapse of her plans. There was no way to predict which one of them, or at what moment, might overturn the entire board simply by saying a few words that were never supposed to be spoken. The Sith Lady even found herself impressed by just how sweeping the changes to the future could become. Of course, she didn’t particularly like any of this, but… she knew how to take the blows of fate. Though in this case, perhaps… fate-breakers would be more accurate? How much had these… mages already changed? And how much more was still going to happen differently from the way it was supposed to?

The funniest part was that, in the end, it even made her happy! First, there was now a real chance not merely to gain an apprentice who would carry out her will, but to obtain a body capable of bearing the “weight” of her spirit. With that, there would be no need to wait for the sentient best suited to her to finally “ripen” and find her. She would be able to gather apprentices herself—and restore the greatness of the Sith Order with her own hands!

And second, she very much wanted to see the faces of the Baneite rats if their “Great Plan” were destroyed and their hopes shattered sooner than fate had intended. She had even begun composing the speech she would deliver to the current Baneite Master. It began with the words: “And you, you wretch, dare call yourself a Lord?”

XoXaan smiled with satisfaction for a moment, feeling malicious delight and anticipation begin to simmer inside her.

But even that wasn’t all. The Dark Lady was interested not only in obtaining a body, but also in the possibility of becoming the same kind of “blind spot” to the sight of every would-be prophet. Of course, she was powerful and could conceal herself on her own, but what kind of Sith would she be if she passed up an opportunity to make herself even stronger?

The sorcerer, as well as his Guild, also interested the Lady. People were a resource, and gifted were a valuable resource. Not to mention the knowledge they possessed—knowledge new to her and, once again, another opportunity to strengthen herself. Before the recent events, XoXaan had not yet decided what to do with the mages and their leader. There were too many possibilities, ranging from completely subjugating both him and the Guild to using them without their even realizing it.

There had been many options. Now, after getting to know him, there were far fewer.

To her surprise—and, in a way, even satisfaction—Siith harbored no negative feelings toward her Order, or toward the Jedi, for that matter. Talking with him had made it clear that the sorcerer, as he put it, “couldn’t care less” who was out there deciding the fate of the galaxy. As long as he was comfortable and no one touched his loved ones, his home, or his wards. His wards, specifically—not his students. Toward the latter he was far more indifferent, merely grumbling, “If they graduated from the Academy, then their lives are no longer my problem.”

His attitude became even clearer when the Lady learned that the sorcerer had come from far away. From a place where they had never even heard of the gifted Orders or their feud. They had their own “magical tradition,” their own wars and conflicts. And so Siith… simply did not see the Dark Side as the absolute Evil the Jedi believed it to be. To him, the war between Light and Darkness, a conflict of unimaginable scale… was nothing more than “religious orders bickering with each other; most mages don’t care about that sort of thing.”

He agreed readily enough to share his knowledge, but on one condition: XoXaan had to swear an oath guaranteeing the safety of the sorcerer, his friends, loved ones, wards, and the rain-soaked world of Jabiim. She agreed easily enough. A Sith was master of his own word. Gave his word, took it back.

That casual attitude disappeared, however, after one of the temple rooms was quickly converted into a small library. Once again, the sorcerer demonstrated his interesting way of working with the Force, this time reshaping stone into bookshelves in the same manner he had grown himself a chair. It bore a distant resemblance to alchemy—but only a resemblance.

After the library was finished and filled with books, Siith dedicated it to his goddess. And at that moment, the faint, contemptuous smirk vanished from XoXaan’s face. For the briefest instant, it was as though a gust of wind swept through her temple complex. Something unimaginably powerful turned its gaze upon the sorcerer, appraised the new “shrine of knowledge,” found it satisfactory, and departed Korriban, leaving behind a tiny fragment of something incomprehensibly vast. And if the Sith Lady had not been watching the process herself, she most likely would not have noticed that fragment at all.

After that, XoXaan was no longer entirely certain that the sorcerer’s stories about the patron goddess of mages, who was supposed to serve as the guarantor of their agreement, were quite such nonsense. Over the course of her long life, she had encountered many things that lay beyond even her own imagination.

What followed only strengthened the Lady’s belief that the standard approach favored by some of her brothers and sisters—“extract everything useful, then dispose of them”—wasn’t so much inapplicable as in need of a much more carefully worked-out plan.

She hadn’t really planned to harm Siith in the first place simply because she was an Evil Ancient Sith. Despite Jedi propaganda, the Dark gifted had never been complete idiots. Well, not all of them, at least. Those with truly strong wills could restrain the base impulses of the monster living inside them. More than that—they had to. The beast itself would never achieve anything, and even if by some miracle it did, it wouldn’t be able to enjoy the fruits of its labor for long. Emotions were supposed to serve the gifted, not the other way around.

In any case, she had no intention of turning back. Her previous plan certainly wasn’t going to unfold the way she had intended, and continuing to sleep in a tomb while waiting for a miracle… frankly, she had no desire to do that. Now XoXaan had a chance to obtain a body, gain new knowledge, and, who knew, perhaps use both that knowledge and this new organization of gifted to ride the crest of the wave. The galaxy was heading toward a series of upheavals; it would be engulfed by chaos, and chaos always offered countless opportunities to the bold and the daring. XoXaan simply had no intention of letting such an opportunity slip away, and so she decided to take the risk. Perhaps the Dark Side had nudged her toward it. Perhaps it was her own curiosity, boredom, and thirst for knowledge and action…

Either way, she and the sorcerer swore their oaths, and the Lady once again felt a drop of attention from something incredible—this time directed at her personally. Something that effortlessly penetrated to the very essence of her being and left within her a fragment of “divine power,” as Siith called it. It was incredible. It stirred her soul and sent thousands of thoughts and ideas racing through XoXaan’s mind. The sorcerer no longer looked like some eccentric indifferent to the world around him; in her eyes, he had become a follower of mighty powers previously unknown to her. The Sith respected power, and passing up the chance to claim a piece of it for herself… was impossible!!!

What did he give his patroness in return? XoXaan remembered hundreds of cults, some of which had worshiped her personally. Sacrifices? Offerings and gifts? She could give more than this sorcerer, who desired nothing but knowledge! All she had to do was gain the power she deserved and show just how interested she was in… cooperation with this Hecate. And then… the oaths would cease to matter. She would simply rise to first place in Siith’s patroness’s eyes and begin reaping the greatest possible benefit for herself!

The “initiation as a mage” only convinced her further that she had made the right choice. That renewed sensation of a presence—carrying with it a sense of fondness, benevolent curiosity, and favor—made her feel the phantom beat of a nonexistent heart. Against the backdrop of the possibilities now opening before her, the fact that she had been cut off from the Abyss of Darkness was met with an almost philosophical calm. She had never truly feared falling in the first place—millennia of experience and a finely honed mastery over Darkness all but guaranteed that she would retain her sanity. Even so, being able to draw on her emotions without constantly worrying about losing her mind was a pleasant and useful bonus.

In any case, for the time being she considered herself to have come out ahead in the bargain. Of course, she would have to conceal her existence from the Jedi stationed on Jabiim…

Oh, Force, how their stupidity amazed her. Such a resource, and they had left it lying in some backwater. In their place, she would have moved both the Academy and the Guild to the capital world long ago, closer to herself. She would have wrung every possible advantage out of them. And there would not even be any need to bring the sorcerers to heel. It would be enough to create the right conditions, and these unusual gifted would gladly give it their all… Ah, what was there even to say? The forces of Light had once again demonstrated their narrow-mindedness by sending only two young Knights to study healing—the discipline the sorcerer called chimerology.

No, it was an interesting discipline, vaguely resembling a blend of Sith sorcery and alchemy, but with several impressive advantages of its own. Take the ability to grow bodies that were “not homunculi,” or the phenomenally rapid healing—practically resurrection. Out of sheer curiosity, XoXaan had even snapped the witches’ necks, each time watching in fascination as nerves, muscles, blood vessels, and bones knitted back together. Fascinating and intriguing. And if chimerology were combined with alchemy, sorcery, and her own creation—Dark Healing…

XoXaan even narrowed her eyes in delight for a moment, considering what might be done with such a combination of possibilities.

For something like that, she was willing to be patient. Even to be nice and restrained, and perhaps stop trying to roast that insolent sorcerer with Force lightning. At least when someone else was watching them.

“What next, Boss?” Arvik grumbled. “The witches are one thing,” the Mandalorian added, casting a peaceable glance at Talli, who smiled calmly back at him, “but a Sith ghost is beyond good and evil.”

“You’re being overly dramatic,” I said, sending a message to Alto. “Just another gifted. No more, no less.”

“Mothers tell their children scary stories where…”

“The Sith come at night and eat babies? Pfft… You don’t say?!” I chuckled, pulling my mug of caf closer. “If you ever end up in my homeland, you’ll be surprised to learn how many scary stories there are about one red-eyed sorcerer in black. They even accused me of having sex with demons atop the corpses of innocent infants and righteous people tortured to death.”

“I think this… XoXaan just caught the Boss’s fancy.” Mlada crossed one leg over the other with a provocative smile. “They curse each other out like they’ve been married for ten years.”

“Uh…” That provocateur really knew how to throw me off balance. “No, of course I argued with my wife. We had our moments. But those were more the exception than the rule, and a family life consisting of one never-ending scandal is not something I want. It gets in the way of work, and the atmosphere in general is… mm… What are you all looking at?”

“You were married?” Karr asked in astonishment.

“Ah, yes.” I shrugged. “I am human, after all, with all the usual wants and needs. So yes, I was.”

“Me, I bit-bit didn’t expect that, though.” Koit scratched his ear in puzzlement. “I thought Boss-sa wasn’t interested in women.”

“What kind of hint is th— ahhh…” I clapped my hands. “Got it. No, that’s not it. It’s just that some of my body’s functions are currently suppressed. I’m not interested in any kind of relationship, so certain instincts were simply getting in the way. I… switched them off, yes.”

“Damn.” Mlada glanced sideways at Romri.

“That’s… I couldn’t do that.” Karr gave a shudder.

I merely shrugged indifferently, already preparing to leave. Chimerologists were far less precious about their bodies than ordinary sentients. Besides, shutting down hormonal surges doesn’t stop you from falling in love—if anything, quite the opposite. You don’t end up in situations where a cocktail of chemicals muddles your judgment.

“Uh, Boss,” Romri stopped me. “When you and your wife argued, what did she call you?”

“Koldun ebuchiy*,” I answered after a short pause, surprised by the question. “I don’t know the exact translation, but Ir’rina said it meant something manly and brutal. I even liked it.”

I smiled at the warm memories and, taking my mug of caf with me, left the common room. While I had the time, I needed to work on the portal project. The theoretical part seemed ready for practical testing. I would have to ask Alto which asteroid could host a laboratory. I really didn’t want to conduct dangerous experiments on Jabiim…

** The common room, after Siith left **

“Did you all see that too?” Mlada looked utterly stunned, as did nearly everyone else in the room.

“Yeah.” Arvik stared blankly at the bulkhead. “He was smiling.”

“No-no.” The Gungan shook his head. “He was smiling nicely, though! Even bit-bit not scary!”

“Yeah. Warm and kind,” Karr backed Koit up.

“Holy shit! I need to pull the surveillance footage, now!” Romri sprang to her feet.

“What for?” the Mandalorian warrior asked in surprise.

“Do you have any idea HOW many credits we could sell that footage for?!” came Romri’s voice from the corridor.

Author’s Note:

Koldun ebuchiy* (колдун ебучий; pronounced roughly kal-DOON yeh-BOO-cheey) — literally, “fucking sorcerer.” https://youtu.be/FQZGzEOBd_w?is=YhTMAjql4xlQNae9