Inheritance


42.

And now it's going to rain.

With sunset came a phalanx of heavy clouds, an ominous roiling mass blowing down from the high open plains above us. Storms on Gola can be brutal; no geological formations stand in the way of icy cold fronts moving in from the lifeless and frigid polar regions. That the Feorians have learned to weather such assaults in their flimsy shelters is an astounding testimony to their patience and forbearance, for doubtless the winds accompanying such a storm do considerable damage to the village and demand painstaking repair. These people did not originally hail from such a harsh environment, and their building practices reflect that fact.. Before they were enslaved and scattered to every corner of the galaxy, centuries ago, Feoria was blessed with a moderate climate. I fear mining interests have since wrecked the planet; it is classified as Sub-Surface Habitable Only, now – and the owners had no interest in hosting a cultural reservation, anyhow.

So the exiles were left with this.

The first droplets spatter and bounce on the hard packed earth. The darkness is punctuated by small orange frames of light where a householder has set a spirit lantern near a door or window opening, to ward off the avenging monster. I pull my hood over my head, drawing my cloak's folds close against the rising wind. Droplets turn to streaks, and then to driving sheets.

Yet I dare not relax my guard, for I can feel something else approach, behind the cover of darkness, riding the storm wind like a steed. Along the ground, just beyond the visible spectrum, apparent only as after-image, the first searching tongues of blue fire waver and crawl. The jabuur-weki is coming, swelling with the laden clouds above, drawing strength from the threat of the storm.

And when the first thunderclap splits the heavens in two, a wrathful presence manifests itself within the seething Force. For a moment I see not looming thunderheads, but the outstretched wings of some nameless monster, leathery clawed arms stretched wide and possessively over us all. A serrated beak opens, screaming bottomless hate, and then disappears as real, natural lightning takes its place. A bolt strikes the earth not ten meters from the village boundaries, and it occurs to me that there are dangers besides those of the Dark Side. Already the rain has transformed to stinging pellets, and I move for cover beneath the pathetic overhang of the long-house.

Fierfek. Just what we needed.

A cloak-shrouded figure slips from the doorway of the guest lodging and dashes across the exposed square, sliding to a sopping wet halt beside me. The rain pours down, sealing us behind a waterfall of run-off. Thunder grumbles menacingly overhead.

"Master!" Kenobi shouts over the din.

I lean closer. "I feel it, too!" I holler back. The jabuur-weki is coming, and the Force is acutely disturbed. A thread of anxiety, of gibbering madness, runs beneath the clamor of the storm, a seductive whisper tugging at our minds. This is the Dark Side, and we are well trained to resist it… but the innocent Feorians are another matter. "This could get ugly," I warn him.

We stand shoulder to shoulder – well, almost – and watch the onslaught dwindle to a heavy mist. A thick layer of hailstones lies upon the frozen soil, not melting. Doors and windows cast ghastly beams of light over the textured ice, and the clouds sink yet lower, until we are wrapped in a cathedral of mist and vaulted shadows. The Dark's whispers grow to a chorus, a twisted anthem. I feel Kenobi tense beside me, his hand – like mine – closed fast around his saber's hilt.

"Where is your Padawan?"

"I told him to stay inside. This is… too much."

I nod. It is indeed. And the boy is dangerous, whether or not Obi-Wan here will admit it. Qui-Gon thought that the child himself might be a vergence in the Force – and if that is so, it is no coincidence that the monster here has been stirred to greater wrath by our arrival. Such principalities should not be brought into such close contact.

A piercing cry cuts across the eerie silence in the aftermath of the rain – but it is a natural sound, the gurgling shout of a creature pushed past its limits. And a moment later, the first of the Feorians emerges from his home, stumbling beneath the low-set lintel of his doorframe. His clothing is disheveled, and his sinewy hands clutch spasmodically at his head , tugging on the drooping ears.

"Ohh! Oooohhh!" the poor, afflicted elder moans, lurching randomly about the square. He is soon joined by others, and then by yet others, some shouting, some crawling on hands and knees, one or two rolling on the icy earth as though in the clutches of a seizure.

"The madness," Kenobi murmurs, and then he is dashing forward, to render assistance.

I follow. But there is little we can do. The Feorians groan and thrash and mutter incoherently, every one of them in the grip of a driving nightmare, a vision from which there is no waking. I keep my mental shields high, blocking out the pervasive stench of the Dark, but despite my best effort I cannot suppress the echo of laughter all about us. The jabuur-weki draws nigh, and a wicked chuckling writhes about it in the Force, a sniggering fanfare, a promise of cruel delight. The Feorians cannot hear our voices, and do not respond to our words. I stand, gazing up at the blackened sky, and again I see a panoply of claws and beaks and emaciated, tattered flesh where there ought only to be cloud.

Thunder crashes down upon us again, setting the insane Feorians to screaming and quaking, many humped into balls upon the sodden earth, hands clamped tight over heads, bodies quivering in abject terror.

"Jabuur-weki!" one of them wails, and the cry is taken up a hundredfold.

"The long-house!" Kenobi exclaims. And there- like some lurid backdrop in a surrealist play, the elders' council house stands, wreathed in consuming fire. Red and gold flames lick at its roof, its walls, and blue smoke rises to mingle with the descending clouds in a sickly admixture of ash and fog. Dancing figures are silhouetted against the vibrant light – the forms of Yonso and a handful of others, torches still in their hands.

"The elders are inside!" my young friend shouts, pelting across the village square, leaping over clusters of crouching Feorians in long bounds. I sprint in his wake, cursing. The arsonists holler obscene defiance to the lowering heavens, the fire catches hold of the building and roars to rival the thunder, and the jabuur-weki screeches with invisible laughter, present all about us and mocking our vain resistance.

And it starts to rain again, the freezing downpour doing nothing to quench the clawing flames. Sparks and hailstones are whipped into a frenzy by the wind, and Kenobi and I are showered with biting fire and ice, every point of pain a reminder of the Dark's ascendancy.

And the Feorians howl in boundless terror, mindless despair.