First Knight - Part Twenty-Three
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Lady Tsara had cursed herself all during dinner for not having worn something more elegant. If she had known that Jerule's guest was going to be a man of such importance and, in addition, so attractive, she would have worn something more appropriate. Now, as she sat in Jerule's drawing room, having after dinner drinks with him and Count Dooku, she tried to sit in her chair in such a way that her best side was to the Count.
When Tsara had received the invitation from Jerule to dine at his home she had, initially, been surprised. The invite had come only a few days after the banquet at which Edress had publicly humiliated her. Tsara had not even had a chance to contact Jerule herself and speak to him of her plans. Therefore, she had eagerly accepted the invitation and, she had noted, Edress had been quite happy to see her go.
However, upon arriving at Jerule's manor, she was surprised to discover she was not the only guest. A tall, striking, white-haired man dressed in dark, rich clothing was also present. Jerule had introduced him as Count Dooku of Serenno.
Tsara, who had been bred to notice such things, observed that Jerule was very obsequious in the presence of the Count. Tsara decided, therefore, to greet the Count as an equal. She held out her withered hand for him to kiss. She noted that he hesitated for a moment, then took her hand and brushed his lips across the back of it.
They had then gone into dinner and during it Tsara had learned that, not only was the Count very wealthy and powerful, master as he was of his family's fortune, but he was currently spearheading a political movement to create a separate galactic government, free from the corruption of the Republic. He was visiting systems all through the Republic and rallying them to his cause.
Tsara had listened, hardly conscious of her food, as the Count, in his deep, powerful voice, had laid out his plans for the Confederacy of Independent Systems. More and more systems, he had told her and Jerule, were joining everyday. He had come to Ahjane, he told them, to see if perhaps the citizens of this world would be interested in joining.
Although Tsara had been spellbound by the Count, the fact that he had chosen to contact someone like Jerule, who not only wasn't a Dynast, but wasn't even of noble birth, had struck her not only as wrong, but rude. Once dinner was over and the three had retired to the drawing room, she was hoping the Count would now see fit to explain why he had contacted a nobody like Jerule for such an important matter.
As Tsara settled into her plush chair and took the glass of brandy the servant offered her, the Count and Jerule sat in chairs opposite hers. Once the servant had given the other two their brandies he left the room, closing the door behind him. Count Dooku looked over at Tsara.
"Lady Tsara?"
"Yes, Count?"
"Although this is not meant as a disparagement to Master Jerule, you are the real reason I have come to Ahjane."
"Me?" she said coyly.
The Count nodded. "I have heard much about you. I believe you to be a woman not only of strength and nobility, but of intelligence and fortitude."
"You have heard correctly," Tsara said proudly, lifting her chins.
The Count smiled and folded his long-fingered hands before him.
"However, Master Jerule has informed me that you have recently been the victim of a grave and, I believe, most unjust misfortune."
Tsara's face hardened. "Yes," she hissed through gritted teeth. "I have."
The Count shook his head as he clucked his tongue sympathetically. "Banished from your home. And by your own son. Such a pity."
Tsara was surprised to feel tears stinging her eyes. She quickly blinked them away.
"Yes," she whispered thickly, her blood singing with anger. "By my own son."
"And for what?" the Count went on smoothly. "For wanting to ensure that your family and your province prosper as it is meant to? That you and yours achieve the prominence and status you are destined for?"
The Count again shook his head, his dark eyes locked onto hers. Tsara could hardly contain the emotions that were roiling in her chest. Finally, someone who understood. K'lia had treated her like some common criminal, when all she had desired was for her family to rule this planet as she believed the gods had intended for them to do.
Tsara's husband, who had been Dynast before K'lia, had been weak and too engrossed in his books and scrolls to grasp the destiny that Tsara had constantly urged him to take hold of. Then, when K'lia was born, she had hoped her son would be the one to bring about that glorious destiny she had long dreamed of. But, like his father, K'lia had been weak and vacillating. Always looking to compromise and find a peaceable way out of any situation.
Why, if it hadn't been for Tsara, K'lia would have tried to find some peaceful means of dealing with the attacks and incursions into their province by Edress's forces. Peaceful means that would have, more than likely, led to K'lia giving up so much in the way of concessions to ensure the peace, their province would have been diminished, if not wiped out entirely.
Instead, at Tsara's urging, they had gone to war but, weak as he was and unable to stand the suffering of his people, K'lia had finally turned to the Republic, which he so fervently believed in, and asked for help. The Senate, in answer to his plea, had sent the two Jedi and, as part of the peace accord they had negotiated, Onara had been given in marriage to Edress. And Tsara had finally saw her chance to achieve her dream. That someone of her blood would rule this world.
Now, all her plans had come to naught. She did not have her great-grandson, his blood pulsing with the power of the Jedi, to shape and to mold in her image. She did not even have a home. She was powerless and she hated it.
"I feel your pain, Lady Tsara," Dooku said quietly.
Tsara, who had been brooding into the fire, turned her head sharply and looked at him. The Count's dark eyes, so mesmerizing, so compelling, seemed to be drawing her in, deeper and deeper into a place where power was not something to be restrained or controlled by rules and policy and the niceties of civilized behavior, but released and let loose, allowed to run free, like a dark, raging storm, rushing through the galaxy, sweeping away the weak and the feeble and leaving only the strong and the powerful to rule as they saw fit.
"I can help you," he went on, his voice as smooth and hard and dark as ebony. "I can help you both."
Tsara managed to tear her eyes away from the Count's. She glanced over at Jerule. He was sitting up, his attention focused entirely on the Count. She saw that he felt it too, the power that was emanating from the man. It was like a flame, but a flame that gave no light, only heat. A heat that enflamed the passions, but not the passions of love and desire, but of ambition and power.
"How?" Tsara managed to say despite the tightening in her chest, for she could hardly contain her excitement.
The past days had been nothing for her but the bitter taste of failure and humiliation but now, finally, she felt hope. Hope that not only would she snatch victory from the jaws of her defeat, but she would also achieve her now rabid taste for revenge. Revenge not only against K'lia for having banished her, but against that Skywalker brat for having uncovered her plot.
"First you must tell me what you want," the Count said. "Both of you."
"I want my great-grandson," Tsara said quickly. "He wouldn't even be here if it weren't for me."
The Count nodded. "Go on."
"I want to return to my province. I want...K'lia gone. I want my great- grandson to be installed as Dynast, with me as regent until he is of age."
The Count gestured for her to continue.
"And I want Skywalker dead."
Tsara was surprised to see the Count's eyes narrowing at her last words. He stared at her for a moment, then turned to Jerule.
"And what do you want?" he asked.
"I want Edress's province."
The Count looked over at Tsara. "You are currently a guest of Dynast Edress, Lady Tsara. Do you have any objections to Jerule's desire?"
Tsara smiled wickedly. "Absolutely no objections whatsoever."
"Excellent." The Count turned back to Jerule. "And if you had the province and were its ruler, what would you do?"
Jerule looked over at Tsara.
"I would help Lady Tsara regain what is rightfully hers," he said without hesitation.
"And what would you ask of the Lady Tsara?"
"Onara."
Tsara's eyes widened. "What? Onara is dying, Jerule. You can't--"
The Count raised one elegant hand, silencing her. "I understand the young lady is dying from midi-chlorian poisoning. Correct?"
Tsara nodded. "That Jedi freak of a physician said nothing could be done to save her. Although, it appears Kenobi has gone on a fool's errand to find some mad ex-Jedi healer who supposedly can save her."
"Sinja-Bau," the Count said, his voice low and thoughtful.
"You know her?" Tsara asked.
The Count stared at her for a moment, his dark eyes impenetrable.
"I know of her. But, as for your granddaughter, I am privy to a means by which she could be saved. However, this particular procedure, unlike the one Sinja-Bau, if found, would perform on her, would leave your granddaughter not quite herself."
Tsara frowned. "What do you mean?"
"I know of someone, very powerful and well-versed in what could be called the darker arts of healing. He could cure her but afterwards," and the Count shrugged, "not much, I'm afraid, would be left of her mind." The Count slid his eyes over at Jerule. "I suspect, however, that it is not the young lady's mind you are interested in, is it?"
Jerule glanced between the Count and Tsara.
"She wouldn't be some slobbering idiot, would she?" he asked.
"Oh no," the Count quickly assured him. "She would only be more...docile, obedient. She would have no will of her own and there would be nothing..."and the Count leaned forward and fixed Jerule with a licentious look,..."nothing you could not ask of her that she would not do."
Jerule's eyes lit up with a burning light and he licked his lips. He looked over at Tsara.
"Onara," he said eagerly. "That is all I would ask of you."
Tsara nodded in agreement. She folded her hands in her lap and looked over at the Count.
"And if you do help us, Count Dooku, what do you want out of it?"
The Count laughed. "Ah, you are a woman after my own heart, Lady Tsara."
Tsara felt a blush on her withered cheeks.
"Very well," he went on. "If you and Jerule are successful in achieving your goals, I would ask only three things of you. First, once you and Jerule have become the rulers of your respective provinces, you are to work to ensure that Ahjane breaks away from the Republic and joins the Confederacy of Independent systems."
Tsara nodded. She was hoping to do that anyway.
"Second," the Count went on. "that you allow your great-grandson to receive some special training."
Tsara's eyes narrowed. "Special training? What kind of special training?"
"Lady Tsara, your great-grandson is no ordinary child. He is Force sensitive. And his father is no ordinary Jedi. He is Obi-Wan Kenobi, one of the strongest Jedi in the Order. The child will, more than like, have inherited his father's gift with the Force. This training that I speak of would hone and refine that gift and ensure that your great-grandson grows up to be a master of men, both powerful and feared. Isn't that what you want?"
Tsara nodded eagerly. "Yes, I want him to rule Ahjane someday."
"And he will. As a result of the training I speak of, he will not only rule, he will dominate this world."
"And the third thing?" Tsara asked.
"In the carrying out of your plans, Skywalker is not to be harmed."
"What?" Tsara cried.
She was so shocked at the Count's words that she sprang from her chair, her glass falling onto the floor, the brandy spilling and staining the carpet.
"He is guarding the child, correct?" the Count inquired.
"Yes, but---"
"Do what you must to acquire your great-grandson, get back your province and see that Jerule has possession of the girl, but Skywalker is not to be harmed in any way. Understood?"
"But...but...he...I..." Tsara sputtered as she clenched her hands. "Why is he to be spared?"
"That is none of your concern," the Count said sharply, his voice flaying her like a whip.
Tsara bit her lip. Her need to see Skywalker suffer for what he'd done to her was like a fever in her brain.
"I understand your need for revenge, Lady Tsara," the Count went on, "but the boy is not to be harmed. If he is, I can assure you that what you have suffered so far will be as nothing compared to what I would do to you."
Tsara swallowed heavily and nodded. "But what about the other Jedi? The freak and Kenobi if he returns."
"They are no concern of mine, but the boy, Skywalker, is not to be harmed. However, I would suggest you expedite your plans so that you have achieved your objectives before Kenobi returns."
"But, if he does return and discovers what we've done----"
"Knight Kenobi is currently operating without the authority of either the Senate or the Jedi Council. Once you have accomplished your goals, they can not be interfered with. Especially by some rouge Jedi. What happens on your world is an internal matter, Lady Tsara. The law is on your side."
"But Onara has only a month," she protested. "Kenobi will try to get back as soon as he can. That doesn't give us much time."
"Then in that case," the Count said with a smile that Tsara noted didn't reach those dark, burning eyes, "we'd best set your plans in motion as quickly as possibly."
To be continued...
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Lady Tsara had cursed herself all during dinner for not having worn something more elegant. If she had known that Jerule's guest was going to be a man of such importance and, in addition, so attractive, she would have worn something more appropriate. Now, as she sat in Jerule's drawing room, having after dinner drinks with him and Count Dooku, she tried to sit in her chair in such a way that her best side was to the Count.
When Tsara had received the invitation from Jerule to dine at his home she had, initially, been surprised. The invite had come only a few days after the banquet at which Edress had publicly humiliated her. Tsara had not even had a chance to contact Jerule herself and speak to him of her plans. Therefore, she had eagerly accepted the invitation and, she had noted, Edress had been quite happy to see her go.
However, upon arriving at Jerule's manor, she was surprised to discover she was not the only guest. A tall, striking, white-haired man dressed in dark, rich clothing was also present. Jerule had introduced him as Count Dooku of Serenno.
Tsara, who had been bred to notice such things, observed that Jerule was very obsequious in the presence of the Count. Tsara decided, therefore, to greet the Count as an equal. She held out her withered hand for him to kiss. She noted that he hesitated for a moment, then took her hand and brushed his lips across the back of it.
They had then gone into dinner and during it Tsara had learned that, not only was the Count very wealthy and powerful, master as he was of his family's fortune, but he was currently spearheading a political movement to create a separate galactic government, free from the corruption of the Republic. He was visiting systems all through the Republic and rallying them to his cause.
Tsara had listened, hardly conscious of her food, as the Count, in his deep, powerful voice, had laid out his plans for the Confederacy of Independent Systems. More and more systems, he had told her and Jerule, were joining everyday. He had come to Ahjane, he told them, to see if perhaps the citizens of this world would be interested in joining.
Although Tsara had been spellbound by the Count, the fact that he had chosen to contact someone like Jerule, who not only wasn't a Dynast, but wasn't even of noble birth, had struck her not only as wrong, but rude. Once dinner was over and the three had retired to the drawing room, she was hoping the Count would now see fit to explain why he had contacted a nobody like Jerule for such an important matter.
As Tsara settled into her plush chair and took the glass of brandy the servant offered her, the Count and Jerule sat in chairs opposite hers. Once the servant had given the other two their brandies he left the room, closing the door behind him. Count Dooku looked over at Tsara.
"Lady Tsara?"
"Yes, Count?"
"Although this is not meant as a disparagement to Master Jerule, you are the real reason I have come to Ahjane."
"Me?" she said coyly.
The Count nodded. "I have heard much about you. I believe you to be a woman not only of strength and nobility, but of intelligence and fortitude."
"You have heard correctly," Tsara said proudly, lifting her chins.
The Count smiled and folded his long-fingered hands before him.
"However, Master Jerule has informed me that you have recently been the victim of a grave and, I believe, most unjust misfortune."
Tsara's face hardened. "Yes," she hissed through gritted teeth. "I have."
The Count shook his head as he clucked his tongue sympathetically. "Banished from your home. And by your own son. Such a pity."
Tsara was surprised to feel tears stinging her eyes. She quickly blinked them away.
"Yes," she whispered thickly, her blood singing with anger. "By my own son."
"And for what?" the Count went on smoothly. "For wanting to ensure that your family and your province prosper as it is meant to? That you and yours achieve the prominence and status you are destined for?"
The Count again shook his head, his dark eyes locked onto hers. Tsara could hardly contain the emotions that were roiling in her chest. Finally, someone who understood. K'lia had treated her like some common criminal, when all she had desired was for her family to rule this planet as she believed the gods had intended for them to do.
Tsara's husband, who had been Dynast before K'lia, had been weak and too engrossed in his books and scrolls to grasp the destiny that Tsara had constantly urged him to take hold of. Then, when K'lia was born, she had hoped her son would be the one to bring about that glorious destiny she had long dreamed of. But, like his father, K'lia had been weak and vacillating. Always looking to compromise and find a peaceable way out of any situation.
Why, if it hadn't been for Tsara, K'lia would have tried to find some peaceful means of dealing with the attacks and incursions into their province by Edress's forces. Peaceful means that would have, more than likely, led to K'lia giving up so much in the way of concessions to ensure the peace, their province would have been diminished, if not wiped out entirely.
Instead, at Tsara's urging, they had gone to war but, weak as he was and unable to stand the suffering of his people, K'lia had finally turned to the Republic, which he so fervently believed in, and asked for help. The Senate, in answer to his plea, had sent the two Jedi and, as part of the peace accord they had negotiated, Onara had been given in marriage to Edress. And Tsara had finally saw her chance to achieve her dream. That someone of her blood would rule this world.
Now, all her plans had come to naught. She did not have her great-grandson, his blood pulsing with the power of the Jedi, to shape and to mold in her image. She did not even have a home. She was powerless and she hated it.
"I feel your pain, Lady Tsara," Dooku said quietly.
Tsara, who had been brooding into the fire, turned her head sharply and looked at him. The Count's dark eyes, so mesmerizing, so compelling, seemed to be drawing her in, deeper and deeper into a place where power was not something to be restrained or controlled by rules and policy and the niceties of civilized behavior, but released and let loose, allowed to run free, like a dark, raging storm, rushing through the galaxy, sweeping away the weak and the feeble and leaving only the strong and the powerful to rule as they saw fit.
"I can help you," he went on, his voice as smooth and hard and dark as ebony. "I can help you both."
Tsara managed to tear her eyes away from the Count's. She glanced over at Jerule. He was sitting up, his attention focused entirely on the Count. She saw that he felt it too, the power that was emanating from the man. It was like a flame, but a flame that gave no light, only heat. A heat that enflamed the passions, but not the passions of love and desire, but of ambition and power.
"How?" Tsara managed to say despite the tightening in her chest, for she could hardly contain her excitement.
The past days had been nothing for her but the bitter taste of failure and humiliation but now, finally, she felt hope. Hope that not only would she snatch victory from the jaws of her defeat, but she would also achieve her now rabid taste for revenge. Revenge not only against K'lia for having banished her, but against that Skywalker brat for having uncovered her plot.
"First you must tell me what you want," the Count said. "Both of you."
"I want my great-grandson," Tsara said quickly. "He wouldn't even be here if it weren't for me."
The Count nodded. "Go on."
"I want to return to my province. I want...K'lia gone. I want my great- grandson to be installed as Dynast, with me as regent until he is of age."
The Count gestured for her to continue.
"And I want Skywalker dead."
Tsara was surprised to see the Count's eyes narrowing at her last words. He stared at her for a moment, then turned to Jerule.
"And what do you want?" he asked.
"I want Edress's province."
The Count looked over at Tsara. "You are currently a guest of Dynast Edress, Lady Tsara. Do you have any objections to Jerule's desire?"
Tsara smiled wickedly. "Absolutely no objections whatsoever."
"Excellent." The Count turned back to Jerule. "And if you had the province and were its ruler, what would you do?"
Jerule looked over at Tsara.
"I would help Lady Tsara regain what is rightfully hers," he said without hesitation.
"And what would you ask of the Lady Tsara?"
"Onara."
Tsara's eyes widened. "What? Onara is dying, Jerule. You can't--"
The Count raised one elegant hand, silencing her. "I understand the young lady is dying from midi-chlorian poisoning. Correct?"
Tsara nodded. "That Jedi freak of a physician said nothing could be done to save her. Although, it appears Kenobi has gone on a fool's errand to find some mad ex-Jedi healer who supposedly can save her."
"Sinja-Bau," the Count said, his voice low and thoughtful.
"You know her?" Tsara asked.
The Count stared at her for a moment, his dark eyes impenetrable.
"I know of her. But, as for your granddaughter, I am privy to a means by which she could be saved. However, this particular procedure, unlike the one Sinja-Bau, if found, would perform on her, would leave your granddaughter not quite herself."
Tsara frowned. "What do you mean?"
"I know of someone, very powerful and well-versed in what could be called the darker arts of healing. He could cure her but afterwards," and the Count shrugged, "not much, I'm afraid, would be left of her mind." The Count slid his eyes over at Jerule. "I suspect, however, that it is not the young lady's mind you are interested in, is it?"
Jerule glanced between the Count and Tsara.
"She wouldn't be some slobbering idiot, would she?" he asked.
"Oh no," the Count quickly assured him. "She would only be more...docile, obedient. She would have no will of her own and there would be nothing..."and the Count leaned forward and fixed Jerule with a licentious look,..."nothing you could not ask of her that she would not do."
Jerule's eyes lit up with a burning light and he licked his lips. He looked over at Tsara.
"Onara," he said eagerly. "That is all I would ask of you."
Tsara nodded in agreement. She folded her hands in her lap and looked over at the Count.
"And if you do help us, Count Dooku, what do you want out of it?"
The Count laughed. "Ah, you are a woman after my own heart, Lady Tsara."
Tsara felt a blush on her withered cheeks.
"Very well," he went on. "If you and Jerule are successful in achieving your goals, I would ask only three things of you. First, once you and Jerule have become the rulers of your respective provinces, you are to work to ensure that Ahjane breaks away from the Republic and joins the Confederacy of Independent systems."
Tsara nodded. She was hoping to do that anyway.
"Second," the Count went on. "that you allow your great-grandson to receive some special training."
Tsara's eyes narrowed. "Special training? What kind of special training?"
"Lady Tsara, your great-grandson is no ordinary child. He is Force sensitive. And his father is no ordinary Jedi. He is Obi-Wan Kenobi, one of the strongest Jedi in the Order. The child will, more than like, have inherited his father's gift with the Force. This training that I speak of would hone and refine that gift and ensure that your great-grandson grows up to be a master of men, both powerful and feared. Isn't that what you want?"
Tsara nodded eagerly. "Yes, I want him to rule Ahjane someday."
"And he will. As a result of the training I speak of, he will not only rule, he will dominate this world."
"And the third thing?" Tsara asked.
"In the carrying out of your plans, Skywalker is not to be harmed."
"What?" Tsara cried.
She was so shocked at the Count's words that she sprang from her chair, her glass falling onto the floor, the brandy spilling and staining the carpet.
"He is guarding the child, correct?" the Count inquired.
"Yes, but---"
"Do what you must to acquire your great-grandson, get back your province and see that Jerule has possession of the girl, but Skywalker is not to be harmed in any way. Understood?"
"But...but...he...I..." Tsara sputtered as she clenched her hands. "Why is he to be spared?"
"That is none of your concern," the Count said sharply, his voice flaying her like a whip.
Tsara bit her lip. Her need to see Skywalker suffer for what he'd done to her was like a fever in her brain.
"I understand your need for revenge, Lady Tsara," the Count went on, "but the boy is not to be harmed. If he is, I can assure you that what you have suffered so far will be as nothing compared to what I would do to you."
Tsara swallowed heavily and nodded. "But what about the other Jedi? The freak and Kenobi if he returns."
"They are no concern of mine, but the boy, Skywalker, is not to be harmed. However, I would suggest you expedite your plans so that you have achieved your objectives before Kenobi returns."
"But, if he does return and discovers what we've done----"
"Knight Kenobi is currently operating without the authority of either the Senate or the Jedi Council. Once you have accomplished your goals, they can not be interfered with. Especially by some rouge Jedi. What happens on your world is an internal matter, Lady Tsara. The law is on your side."
"But Onara has only a month," she protested. "Kenobi will try to get back as soon as he can. That doesn't give us much time."
"Then in that case," the Count said with a smile that Tsara noted didn't reach those dark, burning eyes, "we'd best set your plans in motion as quickly as possibly."
To be continued...