p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;"Ruin reclined in his new throne. Most would have called it ugly. It was crude, fashioned from the coarse remains of ancient stone moldering in his chambers. His lackeys had taken care of the final assembly. They draped a roughspun banner dyed dark red across the top so that it covered the front and back in even measure, its frayed ends kissing the floor. In the center on both sides it bore the device of their order: a black sun ensconced by flame, emblazoned over an eight point star. Just as this one adorned Ruin's throne, a multitude more black-on-red banners draped down from all the citadel's towers./p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;"The throne sat at the edge of the room, right at the arch leading out to his terrace, giving him a grand enough view to ponder his squalid demesne. That was, when he could see it. Frequent snowstorms blurred his vision and soured his mood. The twin banners draped from his own balustrade were often flung so violently by the frigid winds he and his squires always found themselves surprised they never flew free. He was thankful that a switch on the throne's right - a nigh-invisible stone pad - could rotate it in an instant. The relentless snow would then hit the back of his chair instead of his face./p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;"This time when he rotated his chair, he came face-to-face with Lady Bestia kneeling before him. He bid her stand and say her piece./p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""Lord Kaos has left us," she said as she got upright. Her tarnished bile-colored skin shone like the snow. "Does he desert?"/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""No, Lady Bestia," Ruin said to the ceiling. "He has his own task to which he must attend, just as you have yours and I have mine." He turned his head down towards her. The reflection of the light on his cold silver crown caused her to squint. emThis grovelling will not do/em./p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""No new reports from the dig site today, Dark Lord," Bestia said as she looked away. She had fashioned the crown for him out of a chunk of silver they had found amidst the stone detritus that built his throne. The amount was small, and the result was more of a diadem than a true crown, but Ruin treated it as one nonetheless. "Would you like me to return there and remain?"/p
p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"span style="text-decoration: none;""span style="font-style: normal;"No,"/span/spanspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;" Ruin said. This time, he looked her in the eye/span/spanspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;". "/span/spanspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;"I suppose I have need of you now, Lady Bestia." Ruin got to his feet abruptly and began to pace to the other side of the room/span/spanspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;", ignoring the pallor that swept Bestia's face./span/span/p
p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"span style="text-decoration: none;""span style="font-style: normal;"Lord Kaos thinks he has tracked my Shadow Hand," Ruin continued. He did not deign to raise his voice; if Bestia did not he/span/spanspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;"a/span/spanspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;"r, that was her own issue to resolve. "/span/spanspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;"I resolve to leave that issue to him./span/span span style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;"As for you, /span/spanspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;"I think it best that we sort out the other meandering aspects of this new war." He took a seat atop the edge of a metal table they had brought from aboard his flagship and began to restlessly thump his fingers against it. /span/span/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""The Jedi are unaware of where we are fled. They think us slaughtered in our cradle like stillborn babes. They redirect their attention to the crises that have always plagued their homefront in the Core, and to the scourge plaguing the Mid Rim. I am sending you to parley with the Mandalorians."/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""Dark Lord," Bestia gasped. "They bear no love for our kind."/p
p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"span style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;"Ruin sighed. "/span/spanspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;"For good reason: /span/spanspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;"almost three thousand years ago, a great Dark Lord /span/spanspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;"put their clans to the sword, scattered the survivors to the wind, and granted the Republic a victory only to stab them in the back/span/spanspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;"./span/span/p
p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"span style="text-decoration: none;""/spanspan style="text-decoration: none;"'span style="font-style: normal;"Tis /span/spanspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;"true/span/spanspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;" they hate us,/span/spanspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;" my lady, but/span/spanspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;" they hate the Jedi/span/span span style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;"and the Republic /span/spanemspan style="text-decoration: none;"more/span/emspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;". /span/spanspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;"So you will parley."/span/span/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;"Bestia's lip quivered. "My lord-"/p
p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"span style="text-decoration: none;""/spanemspan style="text-decoration: none;"In my name/span/emspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;"," he cut her off. "You will convince them to bind with our side against the Republic. If they do so, I will let them do as they please once the war is won. /span/spanspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;"They can have both the rims for all I care./span/span span style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;"We'll leave them be to do as they will. /span/spanspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;"The Republic has tried for so long to forcibly integrate them; we will not pester them with such nonsense."/span/span/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""And if they do not agree with your little plan, Dark Lord?"/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;"He paid the question little mind. emShe is indolent and insolent alike. She does not wish to be at my side, and yet she does not want to go. /em"Travel with them; burn a world or two, help them take their revenge. If they still will not bend, then remind them of what we are. You have the Force at your command, or did you forget that, too?"/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;"Bestia sighed and bowed her head. "I will be off on your command."/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""Now," Ruin said, getting back to his feet. He made his way back to the throne and slumped down against it. "Mandalore is scouring the Mid Rim for worlds to put to fire and sword."/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""One more thing," Ruin said, resting a spindly finger against his chin. "Summon my squire. I expect to see your ship depart shortly, Lady Bestia. Do not fail me."/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;"Bestia strode out without a word. Ruin let his head hang low for a moment and rested his eyes./p
p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"span style="text-decoration: none;""/spanemspan style="text-decoration: none;"Growing tired? /spanspan style="text-decoration: none;"I pray that you /spanspan style="text-decoration: none;"are not yet/spanspan style="text-decoration: none;" old and feeble, Darth Ruin/span/emspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;"."/span/span/p
p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"emspan style="text-decoration: none;"Why now? /span/emspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;"Ruin jolted and slammed his head into the back of his throne. He pounded with pain. Wincing, he rubbed a hand across the back of his head. /span/spanemspan style="text-decoration: none;"Thankfully, no blood. It would be folly for the boy to see me bleeding/span/emspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;". /span/spanemspan style="text-decoration: none;"Now, voice, what do you want?/span/em/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"The voice laughed its callous little chuckle. That wretched thing always chilled Ruin to the core of his bones./p
p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;""emI see you have your peons tasked with the duty of my freedom. What's the matter? Are you too cowardly to do it yourself, just as you are to deal with the Mandalorians?"/em/p
p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"emThat is the purpose of pawns. What could you know of the art of rule anyway? You have sat trapped under ice for eons untold./em/p
p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;""emI was a Sith lord once, several thousand years ago, before that title even existed,"/emspan style="font-style: normal;" the voice continued. Suddenly, it was as if Ruin's skull were experiencing an earthquake, and a dearth of foreign sounds and images ripped and tore at his brain. The roars of behemoth creatures, the clanging of ancient steel, the smell of burnt flesh, fresh blood, and seas of tears. "/spanemI was there, in what you call the Hundred-Year Darkness with the progenitors of your Order. I walked with XoXaan, with Sorzus Syn, with Ajunta Pall and Baron Remulus Dreypa, as they were exiled after their failed uprising against the Jedi."/em/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"Ruin rubbed at his forehead with palm. emKarness Muur/em? The spirit let out a damnable giggle in response. It was like spiders frolicked along the walls of skull./p
p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;""emNot I, and I never knew the man. But I was like him, in a way. I left the art of war to the Black Marchioness; the way of the sword to Ajunta Pall; alchemy to Lady Syn; rashness and ineptitude to the Baron. I learned from them all and took what I needed. I sought to learn from Muur as well, though the opportunity never came."/em/p
p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"emGet on with it, voice. My squire will be here shortly, and I cannot be ensnared in your riddles when he comes, lest he thinks me mad./em/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;""emThey/em emall think you mad already, Ruin. The boy included. This is of no matter. Permit me continue, I will be brief... this time."/em/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"Ruin sighed and grumbled under his breath. He cupped his head in his hands./p
p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;""emGood. I remained on Koribban with my army of Massassi, after Baron Dreypa departed on his doomed quest of recompense against the Jedi who defeated us with such cruelty at Corbos. So unlike them! Though, at that point they were not yet used to being defied./em/p
p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;""emMy brutish slaves toiled for years to construct for me a laboratory on Korriban while I studied the arts of alchemy in the apothecary of Sorzus Syn and meditated on the blackest arts of the Force in what you call the Valley of the Dark Lords./em/p
p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;""emBut you know this well, Darth Ruin - and if you do not, perhaps you should well learn. The Dark Side begets ambition, it begets want, and cruelty, and rampant desire. Jealousy and covetousness. When I presented all that I had learned to the Dark Lord Pall and his Shadow Hands, horror burned across the his face like balefire. Syn said nothing though her lips went tight in pleasure, whereas XoXaan was more forward in her display. Nonetheless, they obeyed their liege lord when he ordered me restrained. From those restraints, I watched my laboratory turned to dust by a powerful Force maelstrom and my Massassi slaughtered like animals. I was placed into stasis, crammed aboard an outbound vessel and brought here, to die./em/p
p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;""emRhen Var was frigid in those days, yes, but not the wasteland that lies before you now. It was still civilized; this tower was once a Sith stronghold. The bailey behind you, a prison yard. I was handed over to slaves here, tossed in that ravine, and had my cell built up around me. I was never beaten, or starved, or scorned. I was left to die. I made it so that I continued learning instead. The Force came to me in visions while I lie there in fetters against the walls of my ziggurat. The frigid cold cracked my bones, which punched through my thin skin stretched taut by malnourishment./em/p
p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;""emMy epiphany came at last. One day, I felt the winds of the Force coursing through this place, baying like direhounds. I reached out into the endless abyss, just as I had learned from XoXaan, and I felt the veil tear asunder. The taste of salt and iron filled my mouth and droplets of blood fat and swollen oozed from the wrinkles on my forehead. The eye was open, and it saw /emspan style="font-style: normal;"everything/spanem. In one moment, a tundra world became a frigid hellscape of ice and death, and my prison my buried tomb. And now, you have come here to set me free. All as I have foreseen."/em/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"Ruin threw his head back and howled in pain. He thought his own forehead about to rip itself asunder and spew great geysers of blood. He saw it and felt it all at once: the eye opening, the winds of magic howling, the desolation of Rhen Var at the hands of this scion of the Dark Side. He recoiled, whimpering, though not quite drawing tears. He looked up for a moment, and saw Eradicus looking upon him in confusion./p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;""emDo you not prostrate yourself before your Dark Lord, thrall?/em" Ruin bellowed as he jumped to his feet. Eradicus threw himself against the ground at once, his mouth close enough to kiss it. "You interrupt my train of thought, you incompetent disgrace. You play the fool so well you have embecome/em him, thrice-damn you, you wretched boor."/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""A th-th-thousand p-p-p-pardons, m-m-m-master," Eradicus' puny, stammering voice was muffled by the stone floor. "I d-d-did n-n-not mean to-to-to g-g-g-gawk."/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;"Ruin looked down at him. A look of violence twisted his features. Before he knew what came upon him, he was kicking the squire all over. His boot drove into flesh and metal alike. He caught himself only when he found his sole about to fall hard upon the boy's head. He growled in frustration, then he ensnared the Eradicus in the grasp of the Force and dragged him upright by the front of his jerkin. Ruin pinned him there, still as all the stone around them./p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""Speak, emworm/em," Ruin said. He was past the point of needing to use his hands for menial tasks such as this. His mind was more than capable of holding the boy in place as he circled around. "emClearly/em."/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""You called for me, master," Eradicus said. He swallowed hard. "I came."/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;"Ruin stopped for a moment. He sniffed the air./p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""Alas, that is not what I smell," Ruin snorted as the caustic scent of urine wafted to his nostrils. He found himself in front of Eradicus now. It took all his effort not to slap him, and even more not to tear the head from his shoulders. What was he to do with him, now that he had seen him in such a state? He breathed deep, and then released him./p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""What did you see?" Ruin barked at Eradicus as he turned his back./p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""Nothing, my lord." The sound of hands brushing against armor formed a backdrop for his words. "I saw nothing."/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""Then report." Ruin grinned and returned to his throne. He slouched down into where the back and seat met and draped one leg over the other./p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""Our crew are hard at work on the excavation, Dark Lord." Eradicus shifted his legs restlessly, discomforted by the wetness that clung sticky and rank to his thighs./p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""You will keep still in my presence." Ruin's command might as well have been a whisper./p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""Kaos left this morning; Bestia leaves as we speak-"/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;"Ruin raised a finger. "You will address them as emLord /emand emLady/em, or have you forgotten your place, groveler?"/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""Pardons, Dark Lord. emLord/em Kaos left this morning. emLady /emBestia is departing now. Our crew is expecting completion of the excavation project by the end of the month, though they will still need to carve out a proper path to the temple. The crevasse simply will not serve, they say-"/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""To hell what they say." Ruin cut him off with a careless wave of his hand. "When the excavation is complete, I will go down there myself. I will jump if I must."/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""Should you not bring the Dark Council with you?"/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""Did I grant you leave to question me?" emPunishment for his slights would take too much effort. /em"I will go alone. Then, when she is returned, I will bring Lady Cinder. The others have no need of what lies down there."/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;"There was a period of silence that crept across the room, slow and meandering like fog. Eradicus stood still as he could, but occasionally he would waddle his legs. Ruin stared past the boy, at the door. His hand found the button on the side of his throne, and the chair swiveled around at once to face the terrace./p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""Leave me, jester," Ruin said. He watched a claw-shaped blob of grey take to the sky: Bestia's ship. His eyes fixed on it as it sailed off into the night, up through the dagger shaped black clouds and entangled in the light of the crescent moon. He grew irate when he did not hear footsteps. "What? Why do you pester me so?"/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""Dark Lord, what if the Lady Cinder does not wish to return to you?" Eradicus said at last./p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""You truly have become the fool. Why have you sown such idiocy in the barren field that is your mind?" Why would Cinder not want to return to him? She would understand his reasons for leaving her behind on Korriban, and doubtless she would forgive him if she realized the power to which they were about to lay claim. "She does not even know where we are, Eradicus. She is absent out of only ignorance of our location, not out of scorn."/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""Lord Kaos said to me she was like to have turned traitor. She went to Ossus, a Jedi world."/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""A emformer/em Jedi world," Ruin corrected. "It has been abandoned for near two thousand years. If it still bears any life, none of it will be Jedi." He ground his teeth together. "Lord Kaos is an idiot, you have told me this yourself. Why would you listen to him anyhow?"/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""But why would she not immediately seek us out?"/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;"Ruin had grown tired of such impudent questions. He spun his seat around once more and got to his feet. In the next moment, Eradicus flew through the doorway and into the wall where the stairwell began. A violent fissure erupted in the stone when he fell from it, planting his face into the solid floor./p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""On your way down," Ruin said, standing still as he called out to him, "you might inform the lieutenant aboard my vessel that he is to send my Black Guards to me at once." He returned to his throne, leaning forward as he sat, watching the boy stumble to his feet./p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""I will not have the integrity of my Shadow Hand called into question," Ruin said. There was venom in his voice, despite its expressionless timbre. "Not by Lord Kaos, and certainly not by the likes of you. Begone."/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;"His eyes followed Eradicus down the stairs as far as he could see. He let the chair spin once more to face the terrace. A headache accosted him then and there./p
p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""emNow that we are alone again, what say you?"/em/p
p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;"emIs it possible to learn your power?/em/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;"It was as if his head became a cauldron of blood. The cackle seized him as if in a vice and pinched his nerves./p
p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""emWe did not become powerful by being stingy, Dark Lord. I will share this with you. Mayhaps your Lady Cinder as well, if she shows herself. Your obsession with her is almost endearing. Although, I fear it will be your undoing."/em/p
p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;"emSo be it/emspan style="font-style: normal;"./span/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;"The throne sat at the edge of the room, right at the arch leading out to his terrace, giving him a grand enough view to ponder his squalid demesne. That was, when he could see it. Frequent snowstorms blurred his vision and soured his mood. The twin banners draped from his own balustrade were often flung so violently by the frigid winds he and his squires always found themselves surprised they never flew free. He was thankful that a switch on the throne's right - a nigh-invisible stone pad - could rotate it in an instant. The relentless snow would then hit the back of his chair instead of his face./p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;"This time when he rotated his chair, he came face-to-face with Lady Bestia kneeling before him. He bid her stand and say her piece./p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""Lord Kaos has left us," she said as she got upright. Her tarnished bile-colored skin shone like the snow. "Does he desert?"/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""No, Lady Bestia," Ruin said to the ceiling. "He has his own task to which he must attend, just as you have yours and I have mine." He turned his head down towards her. The reflection of the light on his cold silver crown caused her to squint. emThis grovelling will not do/em./p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""No new reports from the dig site today, Dark Lord," Bestia said as she looked away. She had fashioned the crown for him out of a chunk of silver they had found amidst the stone detritus that built his throne. The amount was small, and the result was more of a diadem than a true crown, but Ruin treated it as one nonetheless. "Would you like me to return there and remain?"/p
p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"span style="text-decoration: none;""span style="font-style: normal;"No,"/span/spanspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;" Ruin said. This time, he looked her in the eye/span/spanspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;". "/span/spanspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;"I suppose I have need of you now, Lady Bestia." Ruin got to his feet abruptly and began to pace to the other side of the room/span/spanspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;", ignoring the pallor that swept Bestia's face./span/span/p
p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"span style="text-decoration: none;""span style="font-style: normal;"Lord Kaos thinks he has tracked my Shadow Hand," Ruin continued. He did not deign to raise his voice; if Bestia did not he/span/spanspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;"a/span/spanspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;"r, that was her own issue to resolve. "/span/spanspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;"I resolve to leave that issue to him./span/span span style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;"As for you, /span/spanspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;"I think it best that we sort out the other meandering aspects of this new war." He took a seat atop the edge of a metal table they had brought from aboard his flagship and began to restlessly thump his fingers against it. /span/span/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""The Jedi are unaware of where we are fled. They think us slaughtered in our cradle like stillborn babes. They redirect their attention to the crises that have always plagued their homefront in the Core, and to the scourge plaguing the Mid Rim. I am sending you to parley with the Mandalorians."/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""Dark Lord," Bestia gasped. "They bear no love for our kind."/p
p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"span style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;"Ruin sighed. "/span/spanspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;"For good reason: /span/spanspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;"almost three thousand years ago, a great Dark Lord /span/spanspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;"put their clans to the sword, scattered the survivors to the wind, and granted the Republic a victory only to stab them in the back/span/spanspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;"./span/span/p
p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"span style="text-decoration: none;""/spanspan style="text-decoration: none;"'span style="font-style: normal;"Tis /span/spanspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;"true/span/spanspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;" they hate us,/span/spanspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;" my lady, but/span/spanspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;" they hate the Jedi/span/span span style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;"and the Republic /span/spanemspan style="text-decoration: none;"more/span/emspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;". /span/spanspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;"So you will parley."/span/span/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;"Bestia's lip quivered. "My lord-"/p
p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"span style="text-decoration: none;""/spanemspan style="text-decoration: none;"In my name/span/emspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;"," he cut her off. "You will convince them to bind with our side against the Republic. If they do so, I will let them do as they please once the war is won. /span/spanspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;"They can have both the rims for all I care./span/span span style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;"We'll leave them be to do as they will. /span/spanspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;"The Republic has tried for so long to forcibly integrate them; we will not pester them with such nonsense."/span/span/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""And if they do not agree with your little plan, Dark Lord?"/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;"He paid the question little mind. emShe is indolent and insolent alike. She does not wish to be at my side, and yet she does not want to go. /em"Travel with them; burn a world or two, help them take their revenge. If they still will not bend, then remind them of what we are. You have the Force at your command, or did you forget that, too?"/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;"Bestia sighed and bowed her head. "I will be off on your command."/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""Now," Ruin said, getting back to his feet. He made his way back to the throne and slumped down against it. "Mandalore is scouring the Mid Rim for worlds to put to fire and sword."/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""One more thing," Ruin said, resting a spindly finger against his chin. "Summon my squire. I expect to see your ship depart shortly, Lady Bestia. Do not fail me."/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;"Bestia strode out without a word. Ruin let his head hang low for a moment and rested his eyes./p
p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"span style="text-decoration: none;""/spanemspan style="text-decoration: none;"Growing tired? /spanspan style="text-decoration: none;"I pray that you /spanspan style="text-decoration: none;"are not yet/spanspan style="text-decoration: none;" old and feeble, Darth Ruin/span/emspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;"."/span/span/p
p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"emspan style="text-decoration: none;"Why now? /span/emspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;"Ruin jolted and slammed his head into the back of his throne. He pounded with pain. Wincing, he rubbed a hand across the back of his head. /span/spanemspan style="text-decoration: none;"Thankfully, no blood. It would be folly for the boy to see me bleeding/span/emspan style="font-style: normal;"span style="text-decoration: none;". /span/spanemspan style="text-decoration: none;"Now, voice, what do you want?/span/em/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"The voice laughed its callous little chuckle. That wretched thing always chilled Ruin to the core of his bones./p
p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;""emI see you have your peons tasked with the duty of my freedom. What's the matter? Are you too cowardly to do it yourself, just as you are to deal with the Mandalorians?"/em/p
p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"emThat is the purpose of pawns. What could you know of the art of rule anyway? You have sat trapped under ice for eons untold./em/p
p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;""emI was a Sith lord once, several thousand years ago, before that title even existed,"/emspan style="font-style: normal;" the voice continued. Suddenly, it was as if Ruin's skull were experiencing an earthquake, and a dearth of foreign sounds and images ripped and tore at his brain. The roars of behemoth creatures, the clanging of ancient steel, the smell of burnt flesh, fresh blood, and seas of tears. "/spanemI was there, in what you call the Hundred-Year Darkness with the progenitors of your Order. I walked with XoXaan, with Sorzus Syn, with Ajunta Pall and Baron Remulus Dreypa, as they were exiled after their failed uprising against the Jedi."/em/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"Ruin rubbed at his forehead with palm. emKarness Muur/em? The spirit let out a damnable giggle in response. It was like spiders frolicked along the walls of skull./p
p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;""emNot I, and I never knew the man. But I was like him, in a way. I left the art of war to the Black Marchioness; the way of the sword to Ajunta Pall; alchemy to Lady Syn; rashness and ineptitude to the Baron. I learned from them all and took what I needed. I sought to learn from Muur as well, though the opportunity never came."/em/p
p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"emGet on with it, voice. My squire will be here shortly, and I cannot be ensnared in your riddles when he comes, lest he thinks me mad./em/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;""emThey/em emall think you mad already, Ruin. The boy included. This is of no matter. Permit me continue, I will be brief... this time."/em/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"Ruin sighed and grumbled under his breath. He cupped his head in his hands./p
p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;""emGood. I remained on Koribban with my army of Massassi, after Baron Dreypa departed on his doomed quest of recompense against the Jedi who defeated us with such cruelty at Corbos. So unlike them! Though, at that point they were not yet used to being defied./em/p
p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;""emMy brutish slaves toiled for years to construct for me a laboratory on Korriban while I studied the arts of alchemy in the apothecary of Sorzus Syn and meditated on the blackest arts of the Force in what you call the Valley of the Dark Lords./em/p
p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;""emBut you know this well, Darth Ruin - and if you do not, perhaps you should well learn. The Dark Side begets ambition, it begets want, and cruelty, and rampant desire. Jealousy and covetousness. When I presented all that I had learned to the Dark Lord Pall and his Shadow Hands, horror burned across the his face like balefire. Syn said nothing though her lips went tight in pleasure, whereas XoXaan was more forward in her display. Nonetheless, they obeyed their liege lord when he ordered me restrained. From those restraints, I watched my laboratory turned to dust by a powerful Force maelstrom and my Massassi slaughtered like animals. I was placed into stasis, crammed aboard an outbound vessel and brought here, to die./em/p
p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;""emRhen Var was frigid in those days, yes, but not the wasteland that lies before you now. It was still civilized; this tower was once a Sith stronghold. The bailey behind you, a prison yard. I was handed over to slaves here, tossed in that ravine, and had my cell built up around me. I was never beaten, or starved, or scorned. I was left to die. I made it so that I continued learning instead. The Force came to me in visions while I lie there in fetters against the walls of my ziggurat. The frigid cold cracked my bones, which punched through my thin skin stretched taut by malnourishment./em/p
p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;""emMy epiphany came at last. One day, I felt the winds of the Force coursing through this place, baying like direhounds. I reached out into the endless abyss, just as I had learned from XoXaan, and I felt the veil tear asunder. The taste of salt and iron filled my mouth and droplets of blood fat and swollen oozed from the wrinkles on my forehead. The eye was open, and it saw /emspan style="font-style: normal;"everything/spanem. In one moment, a tundra world became a frigid hellscape of ice and death, and my prison my buried tomb. And now, you have come here to set me free. All as I have foreseen."/em/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;"Ruin threw his head back and howled in pain. He thought his own forehead about to rip itself asunder and spew great geysers of blood. He saw it and felt it all at once: the eye opening, the winds of magic howling, the desolation of Rhen Var at the hands of this scion of the Dark Side. He recoiled, whimpering, though not quite drawing tears. He looked up for a moment, and saw Eradicus looking upon him in confusion./p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in;""emDo you not prostrate yourself before your Dark Lord, thrall?/em" Ruin bellowed as he jumped to his feet. Eradicus threw himself against the ground at once, his mouth close enough to kiss it. "You interrupt my train of thought, you incompetent disgrace. You play the fool so well you have embecome/em him, thrice-damn you, you wretched boor."/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""A th-th-thousand p-p-p-pardons, m-m-m-master," Eradicus' puny, stammering voice was muffled by the stone floor. "I d-d-did n-n-not mean to-to-to g-g-g-gawk."/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;"Ruin looked down at him. A look of violence twisted his features. Before he knew what came upon him, he was kicking the squire all over. His boot drove into flesh and metal alike. He caught himself only when he found his sole about to fall hard upon the boy's head. He growled in frustration, then he ensnared the Eradicus in the grasp of the Force and dragged him upright by the front of his jerkin. Ruin pinned him there, still as all the stone around them./p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""Speak, emworm/em," Ruin said. He was past the point of needing to use his hands for menial tasks such as this. His mind was more than capable of holding the boy in place as he circled around. "emClearly/em."/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""You called for me, master," Eradicus said. He swallowed hard. "I came."/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;"Ruin stopped for a moment. He sniffed the air./p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""Alas, that is not what I smell," Ruin snorted as the caustic scent of urine wafted to his nostrils. He found himself in front of Eradicus now. It took all his effort not to slap him, and even more not to tear the head from his shoulders. What was he to do with him, now that he had seen him in such a state? He breathed deep, and then released him./p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""What did you see?" Ruin barked at Eradicus as he turned his back./p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""Nothing, my lord." The sound of hands brushing against armor formed a backdrop for his words. "I saw nothing."/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""Then report." Ruin grinned and returned to his throne. He slouched down into where the back and seat met and draped one leg over the other./p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""Our crew are hard at work on the excavation, Dark Lord." Eradicus shifted his legs restlessly, discomforted by the wetness that clung sticky and rank to his thighs./p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""You will keep still in my presence." Ruin's command might as well have been a whisper./p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""Kaos left this morning; Bestia leaves as we speak-"/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;"Ruin raised a finger. "You will address them as emLord /emand emLady/em, or have you forgotten your place, groveler?"/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""Pardons, Dark Lord. emLord/em Kaos left this morning. emLady /emBestia is departing now. Our crew is expecting completion of the excavation project by the end of the month, though they will still need to carve out a proper path to the temple. The crevasse simply will not serve, they say-"/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""To hell what they say." Ruin cut him off with a careless wave of his hand. "When the excavation is complete, I will go down there myself. I will jump if I must."/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""Should you not bring the Dark Council with you?"/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""Did I grant you leave to question me?" emPunishment for his slights would take too much effort. /em"I will go alone. Then, when she is returned, I will bring Lady Cinder. The others have no need of what lies down there."/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;"There was a period of silence that crept across the room, slow and meandering like fog. Eradicus stood still as he could, but occasionally he would waddle his legs. Ruin stared past the boy, at the door. His hand found the button on the side of his throne, and the chair swiveled around at once to face the terrace./p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""Leave me, jester," Ruin said. He watched a claw-shaped blob of grey take to the sky: Bestia's ship. His eyes fixed on it as it sailed off into the night, up through the dagger shaped black clouds and entangled in the light of the crescent moon. He grew irate when he did not hear footsteps. "What? Why do you pester me so?"/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""Dark Lord, what if the Lady Cinder does not wish to return to you?" Eradicus said at last./p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""You truly have become the fool. Why have you sown such idiocy in the barren field that is your mind?" Why would Cinder not want to return to him? She would understand his reasons for leaving her behind on Korriban, and doubtless she would forgive him if she realized the power to which they were about to lay claim. "She does not even know where we are, Eradicus. She is absent out of only ignorance of our location, not out of scorn."/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""Lord Kaos said to me she was like to have turned traitor. She went to Ossus, a Jedi world."/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""A emformer/em Jedi world," Ruin corrected. "It has been abandoned for near two thousand years. If it still bears any life, none of it will be Jedi." He ground his teeth together. "Lord Kaos is an idiot, you have told me this yourself. Why would you listen to him anyhow?"/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""But why would she not immediately seek us out?"/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;"Ruin had grown tired of such impudent questions. He spun his seat around once more and got to his feet. In the next moment, Eradicus flew through the doorway and into the wall where the stairwell began. A violent fissure erupted in the stone when he fell from it, planting his face into the solid floor./p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""On your way down," Ruin said, standing still as he called out to him, "you might inform the lieutenant aboard my vessel that he is to send my Black Guards to me at once." He returned to his throne, leaning forward as he sat, watching the boy stumble to his feet./p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""I will not have the integrity of my Shadow Hand called into question," Ruin said. There was venom in his voice, despite its expressionless timbre. "Not by Lord Kaos, and certainly not by the likes of you. Begone."/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;"His eyes followed Eradicus down the stairs as far as he could see. He let the chair spin once more to face the terrace. A headache accosted him then and there./p
p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""emNow that we are alone again, what say you?"/em/p
p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;"emIs it possible to learn your power?/em/p
p style="font-style: normal; line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;"It was as if his head became a cauldron of blood. The cackle seized him as if in a vice and pinched his nerves./p
p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;""emWe did not become powerful by being stingy, Dark Lord. I will share this with you. Mayhaps your Lady Cinder as well, if she shows herself. Your obsession with her is almost endearing. Although, I fear it will be your undoing."/em/p
p style="line-height: 100%; margin-bottom: 0in; text-decoration: none;"emSo be it/emspan style="font-style: normal;"./span/p
