Chapter 21

The Valley of Mirrors, Ziost

Lethe stood upon a vast, frozen lake that dominated the landscape of the Valley of Mirrors. The lake itself was mostly covered in snow, save for patches of ice that had been swept clean by natural eddies that coursed through the valley. The cold was all-consuming; Lethe's breath was visible upon the air, even as sunlight pierced the overcast sky. Otherwise, the area was deathly still; no snow fell upon her or the rest of the assorted congregants this day. It was as though nature itself held its breath, waiting to see what would happen here.

"We've scanned the area, Darth Siphon," a voice spoke to her via comlink. It belonged to one of her soldiers. "We've detected no signs of ambush or enemy reinforcements in the vicinity."

"Good. Inform me immediately if that changes," responded Lethe.

"Yes, my lord."

Behind Lethe, Sierra paced back and forth, her anxiety unhidden from her expression. Three apprentices followed in a similar pattern. A small contingent of their elite soldiers stood in formation behind them, holding ready blaster rifles, each looking more tense than the last. An Imperial walker brought up the rear, its turret swiveling as it switched from scanning the horizon to monitoring the group of sith assembled across the lake.

Hadrax stood at the forefront of the group, with Cyriak whispering in his ear. Hadrax had reverted to sleek and form-fitting attire, accentuated only by the long braid that hung behind his head. Cyriak, on the other hand, had decked himself out in silks and fine leathers dyed in regal - almost flamboyant - colors. Both of them sported a confidence that was unworthy of their stature, that belied their impending defeat.

A dozen sith - all purebloods - formed a semicircle around Lethe's two separatists, each brandishing scarlet lightsabers. Lethe recognized them all as disciples who had once followed Darth Orthas. They now followed Hadrax because they believed him to be the more worthy heir.

Lethe would show them their folly.

The two groups approached each other slowly, eyes watchful for any sign of ambush or sabotage. As Lethe and Hadrax closed the distance between them, they each ordered their respective forces to stand guard a distance back.

"I thought this was supposed to be a duel between us alone, Siphon. Or should I call you impostor?" asked Hadrax.

Lethe ignored the insinuation that she was not the real Siphon. An empty accusation, after everything that had happened. "How kind of you come to the battleground with my disciples in tow," she countered. "I would thank you, but I don't need their aid to put you in your place."

Cyriak offered one of his simpering smiles, then shouted: "We thought it best that there be witnesses to the ascension of a new master."

"Bold claims," said Lethe, continuing her advance. "But I've brought my own 'witnesses.' If they see any interference, we will broadcast your treachery to the rest of the Empire so that all who declare themselves Sith will know of your cowardice."

Hadrax pulled out his twin lightsabers and activated them. "It is not I who will be proven the coward here."

They stood only a few meters apart now. Lethe activated her own weapon with one hand while the other clutched the Holocron tight in her leather gloves. With it at her side, she would end this joke of a duel quickly and once more her house would be united.

"Any last words, Hadrax?"

"Last words? No. But I do have words I would share with you. You, the impostor. Usurper. False Sith. I will show you the might of Orthas' legacy! The Empire will know again the value of the pureblooded. All will know our superiority!"

With that, Hadrax launched himself into the air, a whirlwind of speed, lightsabers striking downwards in an overhead slash. Lethe screamed her fury; she shouldn't have given him the first strike. She swung her own weapon upwards to block, but the sheer strength of the Hadrax's attack almost pushed the blade of her lightsaber into her mask.

The pureblood smiled, crazed. He drew one blade back, and then drove it forward towards her gut. Lethe surged the Force into her legs, dashing back to avoid the strike. As her feet landed on solid ground once more, she made to draw strength from the Holocron. Just as she completed her conjuring, her opponent leaped forward, bounding toward her like a rabid akk dog.

She could end him here and now. But from the recesses of her mind, Sierra's words echoed into her core. Lethe already knew she couldn't trust her apprentice. But then … why did her words resonate with her so?

Each time you invoke it, you lose a bit more of yourself to it. It's changing you, and not for the better. Don't lose yourself to the Holocron. You don't need it.

Sierra was right about one thing. Lethe didn't need the Holocron to defeat Hadrax. Lethe was disciple to Siphon; she had assumed Siphon's very identity. Hadrax might be skilled, might even be the most prodigious apprentice to Orthas … but Siphon had beaten Orthas. And so would Lethe defeat Hadrax.

She would prove that fact to herself.

The roar of Hadrax's battlecry renewed her focus to the task at hand. Lethe recognized the initial steps of his Ataru attack stance. The man was impossibly fast; she could barely track his movements. She parried each of his strikes only at the last second; before she could return an attack of her own, he vanished, pirouetting away only to reappear at her side, behind her, above her, beneath her.

He thrust upwards at her neck from a crouching position; their blades had no sooner clashed than when he somehow appeared behind her back to swipe at her waist. Lethe caught the attack just in time, but too late to counter. It was clear his mastery of Ataru far-outclassed her own skill in Niman. Every time she moved to seize the offensive, Hadrax was already striking from another angle, another position: an acrobat overdosing on stimulants.

But speed alone would not afford him victory. Lethe soon recognized a pattern in his attacks. She waited for the right moment - an airborne overhead slash that left him without leverage to dodge - if she could just catch him then …

She saw her opening, and seized it. With both hands, she hurled him backwards through the Force, sending him flying. Lethe did not let up. Just as he was about to recover, she slammed her hands downwards, intending to crush him into the ice much the same as she had done to Sierra.

But Hadrax was defiant. He leveraged his body's downward momentum, amplified by the power of Lethe's Force attack, to punch the ice beneath him. Empowered by the Force, Hadrax's blows sent quakes rippling outwards. Lethe lost her balance and her grip over the pureblood dissipated.

In the second it took to steady herself, Hadrax was in the air once more, this time with only a single lightsaber, launching into a spinning slash. Lethe reflexes drove her to prepare a defense against the incoming assault, but instinct and the sound of an oscillating energy beam resonating from behind her saved her from a fatal mistake. At the last second, she whirled around to knock aside the lightsaber that Hadrax had directed to skewer her. In the next second, she turned back around to -

"Master, look out!" cried Sierra.

She did not need the girl's interference!

"I HAVE YOU!" screamed Hadrax from above. The pureblood flipped his blade around in midair to drive it downward, the tip of his lightsaber desperate to plunge into Lethe's head. She couldn't move fast enough to bring her lightsaber up to deflect, didn't have the time to gather the requisite energy for tutaminis. All she could manage through the Force was to redirect Hadrax's trajectory so that his blade only grazed the side of her mask before driving into empty air.

The pureblood's body continued unabated, carried by momentum to slam into Lethe. His knee hit her gut as they both toppled over and Lethe almost vomited before they both collapsed onto ice and snow, their lightsabers flying from their grips. Both their weapons hissed angrily as they made contact with the frost before the blades retreated into the hilts. Steam rose in steady gusts around them as they struggled to disentangle from each other.

Hadrax was the first to get to his feet, both arms outstretched to summon his weapons back to his hands. But where Hadrax needed physical weapons, Lethe needed only her mind. Even winded, collapsed on the ground, she still had the strength to seize victory. She thrust her right arm upward in a gouging motion and in that instant, she knew she had won.

Frenzied whispers fled her tongue to assault Hadrax's mind: they were a crushing darkness, unbridled chaos, madness incarnate. The pureblood screamed his agony, his fear. His lightsabers flew to his hands, only to collide against unmoving palms and then fall to the snow unacknowledged. Instead, Hadrax began clutching at his head, his eyes, his face, clawing at his skin, desperate to peel out the affliction with which Lethe had cursed him.

"You think you are the heir to Orthas' legacy?!" She laughed, still panting for breath. "The only thing you've inherited is delusion!"

"Snap out of it Hadrax!" Cyriak shouted, unable to hide the panic from his tone. "Don't let her win!"

Lethe offered her betrayer no respite. Slowly, she got to her feet, one hand still affixing an iron vise around Hadrax's perception. With the other, she invoked the Force again, simultaneous but with different purpose. As her right hand lifted to steal from Hadrax his sanity, her left hand pushed down to take from him his defiance.

Hadrax sank to his knees.

All who would defy us,
know only submission.

"Get up! Get up!" screamed Cyriak.

Lethe had won.

She could kill him now. Could make him an example of the consequences of rebellion. She could end his threat once and for all. She could offer him to the Holocron, could use this traitor's life as a tribute to the Ancient Sorcery. What was it that it demanded?

All who would strive for us,
know only sacrifice.

And yet, still the voice in her mind cried out for absolution. This was not her way. Mercy was the mother of unity. The progenitor of strength. She wanted to slay Hadrax, wanted to erase him from existence, but could she afford to sacrifice her ideals, even once?

So lost in thought, she almost didn't hear Sierra cry out: "Stop!" Almost didn't hear Cyriak shout "DO IT!" Almost didn't hear a high-pitched whining emanate from below, from an unknown source, shrieking its displeasure - it sounded remarkably like a thermal detonator.

She heard the explosion first before she felt it rock the world like an earthquake.

The ice beneath Lethe splintered, then cracked. Translucent lines snaked out like a spider's web from the epicenter of the detonation, fracturing the frozen lake below her feet. Lethe looked down. For a second, she watched as the reflection of Siphon's mask - the mask that was supposed to be bound to her face forever - shattered into a hundred pieces.

For a second, she thought she was free.

Then, she felt herself fall, tumble, collapse into a massive pool of freezing water. She couldn't find her lightsaber, didn't know if it had sank to the bottom of the lake or if had been knocked away on the surface. The shock of the cold demanded immediate attention and overwhelmed all other thoughts. Was this Hadrax's doing?! How could he have -

From above, she heard Hadrax's thundering voice through the water, crazed and furious even distorted through the lake: "What are you doing Cyriak?! She's mine! SHE'S MINE!"

"Don't stop, you fools!" screamed Cyriak. "Kill Siphon! Kill her now!

Even submerged in freezing water, Lethe felt the Force twist as Hadrax and Cyriak's disciples thundered forward. She knew what they were going to do - she thrust her arms into drawing a circle around her in the water; the Force did her will, pushing the liquid from her body so that she floated in a suspended bubble of air - just in time to see four surges of brilliant lightning surge into the lake, electrifying everything in its path.

Protected in her sphere, Lethe avoided the deadly trap - but the effort robbed her of so much strength. It was all she could do to surge upwards, using the Force to propel her out of the electrified water, landing shakily on a large patch of unbroken ice.

Still drenched and freezing, it took a moment for her to assess what had happened.

In the distance, Lethe saw her forces engage a throng of the separatist's Sith disciples - her own apprentices no match for Hadrax's training. Her walker managed to blast a few to smithereens, but it was quickly cut down by repeated lightsaber strikes to its mechanical limbs. The rest of her soldiers launched volleys of blaster fire at their Sith enemies, most to no avail, but their numbers seemed - for the moment - to occupy their attention.

Nearby, four corpses of Hadrax's disciples littered the frost-covered lake; Lethe suspected they were the ones who had sprung the lightning-infused trap. Not far from the bodies, Sierra had engaged Hadrax and Cyriak in vicious combat. She moved like a demon, possessed of unflinching resolve, but she was hard-pressed to seize any advantage in this lopsided contest. Every time she moved to attack, she was forced instead to defend another incoming assault. Curiously, Hadrax seemed just as intent on killing Cyriak as he did Sierra; his attacks launched against his fellow pureblood came in equal measure to the ones he threw at Lethe's apprentice.

"What are you doing?! I'm on your side!" screamed Cyriak.

"I told you not to interfere, snake!"

"You would be dead without me, you bantha-brained fool!" retorted Cyriak. "She had you on your knees!"

"Cowards!" screamed Lethe. "You betray the terms of our duel, just as you betrayed the terms of your master's Kaggath!"

Hadrax whipped around. "I betrayed nothing! Cyriak's head will follow yours, but I will not allow his treachery to steal this victory from me!"

"Did you really think I would let our fates be decided by a duel?!" sneered Cyriak, before turning back to his fellow rebel. "This is your chance Hadrax! Take Siphon while I finish off her whelp!"

Hadrax snarled at Cyriak, but turned back to Lethe all the same. He had retrieved his weapons, and the energy beams sizzled at the base, where they had gotten wet in the earlier skirmish.

"Don't tell me you still think you can win?" asked Lethe, hoping the pureblood would not see through her bravado. The strain of the last few moments was already sapping the strength from her exhausted limbs.

"I don't think. I know."

"No, you don't think, do you?" Lethe sniped. "You only have your base prejudice and its dictates, the false ideologies that Orthas implanted in you, the undeserved arrogance of a buffoon playing at significance."

Hadrax roared. "I will cut the tongue out from your mask!"

But Lethe would not let Hadrax get the first move again. Her weapon lost, she only had the Force to do her bidding. She molded her hand into a claw and thrust it upwards, seeking to latch onto Hadrax's mind once more, to return him to that quivering, pathetic state on his knees. But the pureblood was ready this time, dodging Lethe's invoked power and charging forward to return the contest to one of close-combat.

Lethe would be at a distinct disadvantage if she had to face his Ataru without her weapon. She empowered her feet, forced them to move, but the exertion was excruciating - Lethe's strength fled her body with increasing speed. Her movements and reflexes slowed to a dangerous crawl. Hadrax did not lack for stamina, driving forward to assault her with incredible agility, as though he stood refreshed and renewed.

Her eyes darted around the area for her lightsaber, but it was nowhere to be found, camouflaged by the ice and snow of her surroundings. Her options were fast becoming limited. She couldn't let him get in striking distance, not while she was still unarmed. She directed a turbulent blast in his path of movement, but Hadrax seemed now somehow prescient of her strategy. Even as her arm extended, the pureblood sidestepped out of harm's way and then continued on his course, unabated.

Dread curled its skeletal fingers around her heart.

She still had the Holocron. If she could just summon its power in time, bring its full might to bear against Hadrax, he would be nothing! She thought she didn't need it, but now was not the time to quibble over pride. She needed to reenact that moment with the real Siphon, that moment she laid her old master low.

A current of wind howled through the valley as she felt the power rise in her chest, spread through her circulatory system to infuse her with living Force, with ancient and boundless knowledge. All that was left was to direct it. Hadrax continued his charge - he was almost upon her. Her hands inched forwards to unleash her attack, so slow, too slow! They moved as though drowned in a sea of molasses even as one of Hadrax's lightsabers lanced forwards, impossibly quick, a blur of motion and deadly intent.

She wasn't going to make it.

Hadrax screamed. "Unworthy scum!"

It was all she could do to convert the Holocron's attack into a barrier at the last second; sparks exploding outwards as the scarlet lightsaber collided with pure Force.

She had almost nothing left. The well was almost dry, her reserves of strength sapped to near their limit. She had no time to summon more from the Holocron again. She had no defense.

Hadrax raised his other lightsaber high into the air, mouth stretched wide in triumphant glee. "So ends the reign of Darth Siphon!"

No. Not like this!

So certain was Hadrax of his victory, that he didn't notice the whirring blade of a lightsaber arcing towards him, flying through the air, whistling its intent.

Not until it severed the hand holding his lightsaber from his arm.

Lethe didn't understand at first - and she could tell neither did Hadrax. The glee on his face turned slowly to disbelief, to shock, to indignation. Lethe turned to see Sierra racing towards them, eyes locked on her apprentice's outstretched hands, hands that had flung the lightsaber that now arced back towards her with victorious declaration.

But she hadn't asked for Sierra's help. She didn't want it. She didn't need it. The girl had stolen Lethe's victory, had tainted the duel just as Cyriak did.

Hadrax screamed his agony. "How - how dare you?! I am pure of blood, I am a true Sith! You are an impostor, a fraud! You can't win!"

"I can!" Lethe summoned what power she still had, empowered by fury, charged by rage. She gripped the base of Hadrax's skull through the Force, so violent that he lifted off the ground for just a second. Then she closed her hand into a fist, squeezing, choking, suffocating. Hadrax's eyes bulged in terror; Lethe watched as the man tried clawing at his neck, still suspended in above the ground, one hand missing, pawing at empty air.

"No!"

The cry came from Cyriak. It was Lethe's turn to be caught unawares as a torrent of Force Lightning surged into her body, racking her torso, her limbs, seizing her mask, amplifying unbearable pain.

Hadrax's unconscious body dropped to the ground in a crumpled heap.

"I will never bow to you again!" shrieked Cyriak as he continued to surge electricity into her. Lethe wanted to scream, but the sound erupted from her mask in distorted and shuddering wheezes. She could not be defeated like this. Not like this.

Suddenly, the pain stopped. It took a second for Lethe to realize what had happened - Sierra had used the Force to throw Cyriak back, interrupting his attack. The sycophant landed on his feet, limbs ready to throw himself back into battle, but his eyes darted first to assess the situation. Lethe did the same as Sierra threw herself in front of her in a defensive stance, panting heavily.

Lethe's own forces were all-but demolished - their corpses strewn about in a bloodless massacre, but of the disciples Hadrax and Cyriak had brought with them, only three remained standing far in the distance. Lethe couldn't identify them, hadn't recognized them earlier. Two against four. In normal conditions, Lethe would not have hesitated to take them on - but weakened as she was by Cyriak's treachery, she was no longer sure she could emerge the victor. She was exhausted, panting for breath, vision blurring. If they were to unite against her -

"This isn't over," hissed Cyriak. With one hand, he summoned Hadrax's body to him, swinging the unconscious pureblood's form over his shoulder. He then slowly backed away a few steps before racing to rejoin his remaining apprentices while signaling a retreat. Some things didn't change. Cyriak was still a craven.

Sierra started to bound after them, but Lethe would not have it. "Stop!"

"I can take them, master! We can end this here and now!"

"They are mine! Let them run. They cannot hide from me forever."

"But Darth Siphon -"

Lethe screamed. "You will do as I say! I don't need your aid to defeat these whimpering vermin, I never did! Who asked you to intervene against Hadrax? Who told you you could strike at him?!"

Sierra looked stunned. The words fled her mouth in disbelieving spurts. "M-master … I … I thought he was about to … I feared for your life."

It didn't matter if the words were true. It didn't matter that the outcome would likely have been far different had Sierra not intervened. Lethe knew only one truth. Because she did not leverage the Holocron … she had to be saved by her apprentice. Because of her foolish reservations, she suffered another humiliation.

Lethe didn't acknowledge Sierra's explanations. "We're going back to the Citadel. Get the shuttle ready."

The girl bowed her head and returned to the shuttle. Lethe watched her go, then turned to spot Cyriak and his remaining followers in the distance, scurrying to do the same.

Cyriak. The man's treachery knew no bounds. Lethe had no doubt that it was he who had planted thermal detonators beneath the lake surface in anticipation of Hadrax's defeat. A coward that was no fool. He knew Hadrax would not be able to take Lethe head on and had planned for that eventuality. If it weren't for his duplicity, Lethe would not have needed Sierra to secure victory.

Lethe cursed her shortsightedness - she should have known Cyriak would have something up his sleeve, something he kept even from Hadrax. The latter's pride would never have agreed to such a ploy; Lethe's mistake was in thinking Cyriak would let himself be shackled by his fellow rebel's ego. In many ways, the cunning sycophant was a far more dangerous opponent than the brazen egotist.

She would not make the same mistake. The time for reservation, for hesitation, for doubt … it was over.

She would not risk losing again.

Lethe watched as Hadrax and Cyriak's shuttle took off, departing into the horizon, before heading back to her own vehicle.