The Old Republic Series

by Sean Williams

  CHAPTER 13

  CLAN ORDO’S VICTORY CELEBRATIONS continued late into the night. Six members of the clan, four men and two women, had died in the battle, a quarter of the casualties they had inflicted on Clan Jendri.

  Veela had ordered all thirty bodies to be gathered together into a massive funeral pyre. Revan understood this mixing of friend and foe: they were all Mandalorians who had died in battle. By custom they were all due a warrior’s funeral, regardless of which clan they had been fighting for. The pyre burned for hours, the flames lighting the night and warming the camp as the brothers and sisters of the fallen recounted tales of their bravery. They honored their memories through song and feast, simultaneously grieving their deaths and celebrating the resounding Ordo victory.

  The ale flowed freely, but Revan had limited himself to a single mug. Because he had fought with Clan Ordo, he was entitled to join the revelry. But though he knew their customs, he wasn’t Mandalorian. It was difficult for him to rejoice in the loss of comrades, no matter how honorable their deaths may have been. Revan was also wary of what Veela might do now that she knew he was a Jedi. Hopefully she just thought he was an anonymous rogue Master; if she knew who he really was there could be trouble.

  Many Mandalorians despised the Jedi—and Revan in particular. Revan had been responsible for countless Mandalorian deaths, and he had stolen and hidden Mandalore’s Mask, an act some considered a war crime. Considering Veela’s fierce pride in her people and her culture, she probably wouldn’t simply forgive and forget. Fortunately, it seemed like she wasn’t aware of his true identity.

  Over the course of the evening, Edric and several others came over to speak with him, making a point to include him in the clan festivities. Everyone seemed to know he had drawn the fire of the enemy Basilisks, allowing the pilots to reach their mounts. Interestingly, though, none of them knew any of the details of what had occurred out beyond the edges of the main battle. Obviously Veela had sworn the other pilots to secrecy.

  He should have taken that as a good sign, but he kept catching glimpses of Veela and the other pilots watching him suspiciously. They might not know he was Revan, but they knew he was a Jedi and that clearly bothered them.

  He wasn’t sure if Veela had ordered them to stay silent out of respect for what he had done during the battle, or because she thought they still needed him to find Mandalore’s Mask, or even because of her feelings for Canderous. But whatever the explanation, his secret seemed safe … for now.

  When he finally climbed into bed late that night he was surprised to hear Canderous come stumbling into the tent a few minutes later.

  “I thought you’d be with Veela.”

  “She’s not too happy with me right now,” Canderous explained. “I’ll let her cool down for the night.”

  “Sorry about that.”

  “You did what you had to do,” his friend answered as he settled into his sleeping bag. “Sooner or later it was going to come out anyway.”

  “How bad is this?”

  “Veela doesn’t like Jedi,” Canderous admitted. “But she’s hard to read. Hopefully she’ll just hold a grudge for a few days.” The big man rolled over onto his side. “Either that, or she’ll try to kill us on tomorrow’s climb.”

  Revan couldn’t tell if he was joking.

  ——

  THE WEATHER IN THE MORNING was the same as every other morning on Rekkiad—freezing cold, with fierce winds and swirling snow that limited visibility. Revan had been hoping for a calm, clear day so they could use the Basilisks to fly them up to the top. But even here at the base, unexpected gusts had enough strength to almost knock him off his feet. Higher up, the wind shear and lack of visibility would make an attempted landing on the summit suicidal, even for the most skilled pilots. Dangerous as it was, climbing to the top was the only real option.

  “Bad conditions for an ascent,” Canderous remarked as they stood at the base of the first Spear.

  “This is as good as it gets,” Veela said. “If you’re scared, I’ll get Edric to take your place and you can watch over the camp.”

  “The old man would probably have a heart attack halfway up,” Canderous answered with a grin.

  “He’s only a year older than you,” Veela pointed out.

  “But I’m like a fine wine,” he replied. “I get better with age.”

  The playful exchange eased some of Revan’s concerns about the mission, though he still wasn’t thrilled by the makeup of the climbing team. There were eight of them in total: Revan, Canderous, Veela, and the five other Basilisk riders, including Grizzer—the young man who’d given up his mount to Canderous.

  Veela’s picks made a certain amount of sense. Going after Mandalore’s Mask was a great honor, and the Basilisk riders were among the most respected warriors in the clan. The only other person who might have been included was Edric, but he had been chosen to stay behind to lead Clan Ordo in case Veela and the others never came back.

  Yet Revan couldn’t help noticing that all of the climbers chosen knew he was a Jedi. And Edric, Canderous’s oldest and most loyal friend, was being left behind. He wished he’d had a chance to talk to Canderous before they had left. Now all he could do was keep his guard up throughout the ascent, just in case.

  They broke into two teams of four, the members of each team connected by a long length of climbing rope. Canderous, Revan, and two of the pilots made up the first group, Veela and the other three pilots the second. In addition to their winter clothing and gear, each climber had a twenty-kilo pack of supplies and rations strapped across his or her shoulders.

  The two teams began their ascent simultaneously, moving along parallel paths up the sheer vertical surface of the wall of ice that made up the Spear’s face. Each meter of progress was earned only by hacking into the ice, chipping away with a sharp-ended pick to create a small hold for a hand or foot, then hammering a braced pulley into the wall to secure the climbing rope. The pattern was repeated again and again.

  Progress was slow and exhausting; a single misstep could send a climber plunging to a quick and gruesome death. Theoretically, the ropes and pulleys connecting each team should allow the other three members to bear the weight if one should fall, but none of them was inclined to test the theory.

  AFTER ONLY FIFTY METERS, the roaring wind was already strong enough to rip away their voices, forcing them to communicate with simple hand gestures. Despite the cold, Revan was sweating heavily beneath his layers of clothing, his body warmed by the steady physical exertion as they battled their way meter by painful meter toward the top.

  At least he was safe from Veela for the time being. The difficult climb required total focus and concentration from every climber as they worked in concert to reach the peak. Even if the Ordo pilots were plotting against him, they simply wouldn’t be able to try anything until they reached the plateau at the top.

  At the start of the climb the summit was invisible, lost in the swirl of snow and clouds. But by the fifth hour they had risen above the worst of the storm, giving them their first glimpse of the Spear’s peak, illuminated by Rekkiad’s pale orange sun.

  They were well over halfway to their goal, but exhaustion and fatigue were beginning to impede their progress. As the altitude increased, the air became thinner, leaving all the climbers panting and gasping. The pack strapped to Revan’s back seemed to have doubled in weight, and he could feel the straps digging into his shoulders even through his clothes. But there was little to do except ignore the pain and concentrate on the climb.

  Veela’s team was about fifty meters ahead. Suddenly one of their riders lost his footing and slipped. He dropped ten meters before the ropes abruptly stopped his fall, leaving him dangling helplessly at the end of the line. The abrupt stop had jerked his backpack partially around, twisting the shoulder straps so that his arms were partially pinned behind his back. Combined with the howling winds buffeting him back and forth, he was unable to reestablish a grip on the mountain.

 
; Veela and the others began the slow and careful process of climbing back down to help him. It took about two minutes for Revan’s team to draw level with Veela and her crew as they backtracked to rescue the wayward climber. Realizing the situation was under control, Revan’s team pressed on toward the top.

  Five minutes after the fall, Revan glanced back down to see that all four of Veela’s team were once again safely in position. They were not trying to regain the lead, but moved more slowly and cautiously than before.

  Two hours later Revan’s team reached the top. Canderous was first; planting his feet firmly, he reached down to grab Revan’s arm and haul him up. Revan did the same for the woman trailing behind him, and she did the same for the man behind her.

  The top of the first Spear was a featureless plateau of slick ice covered by a thin dusting of snow. Looking across the gap between the two Spears, Revan could see that the other summit was as bare and featureless as this one.

  “Now what?” Canderous shouted over the roar of the wind.

  “If this is the right peak, there should be an entrance around here somewhere,” Revan yelled back. A gust of wind shoved him sideways, and he almost stumbled.

  “An entrance to what?”

  Revan only shrugged. His vision hadn’t shown him what he and Malak had discovered, and no more memories had bubbled to the surface during the climb.

  They all set their backpacks on the ground and started a grid-pattern search over the plateau’s surface. It didn’t take them long to find what they were looking for.

  Near the center of the plateau, under a dusting of snow, was a small durasteel hatch. Revan grabbed the handle and pulled hard, calling on the Force to give him strength when he felt his muscles beginning to strain. Slowly, reluctantly, the heavy cover swung open to reveal a ladder leading down into darkness.

  “You stay here and wait for Veela,” Canderous ordered the other two Mandalorians. “We’ll go down and check it out.”

  He retrieved several glow sticks from his backpack on the ground, along with a blaster pistol. Revan didn’t have a weapon in his pack. Everyone on the climb already knew he was a Jedi, and he was confident the lightsaber at his belt would be enough to deal with anything they ran into.

  Not that he expected any trouble. It was hard to imagine a more remote, isolated, and inhospitable location. It was easy to see why he had decided to hide Mandalore’s Mask here.

  But where was here, exactly? Why was there a secret underground chamber built into the Spear, and how had he and Malak found it in the first place?

  Canderous walked over to the hatch and dropped one of the glow sticks into it. It tumbled down, illuminating the length of the shaft as it fell. It stopped some thirty meters below, bouncing, rolling, and then settling on the ground.

  “After you,” Canderous said.

  As Revan began the long descent, his mind started to spin. Brief flashes of dormant memories exploded into his consciousness, only to vanish before he could fully grasp them.

  He had an overwhelming sense of déjà vu; he knew with certainty he and Malak had explored the dark chamber beneath the ice just as he and Canderous were exploring it now.

  The sights and sounds of his previous visit blended with his current surroundings, the images overlapping one another, obscuring his vision and making him dizzy. It got so bad that Revan had to close his eyes, clinging to the rungs of the ladder with a tense grip.

  “You okay?” Canderous asked from a few meters above. His voice echoed loudly off the rough-hewn rock walls.

  “My past is catching up with me,” Revan explained, shaking his head to dispel the vertigo.

  He waited a few more seconds, and when he opened his eyes again everything had returned to normal. Taking a deep breath, he continued downward until he reached the bottom. The shaft ended in a tight, twisting tunnel that continued horizontally. Resisting the urge to draw his lightsaber, Revan pulled out another glow stick and started down the passage. Canderous followed close behind.

  The tunnel was narrow, forcing them to walk single-file, but the ceiling was high enough that even Canderous didn’t have to duck. It didn’t take long for Revan to realize that they were walking on a slight decline, going ever deeper into the heart of the Spear. The air around them grew warmer, causing them to unbutton their jackets and lower their hoods.

  As they continued on, Revan began to feel the unmistakable presence of the dark side. His hand dropped to the lightsaber at his belt, but he relaxed as he realized that the sensation was too faint to signify an immediate threat. Once the Force had been strong in this place, but over time—many decades, or even centuries—it had faded away to little more than a memory.

  Eventually the passage brought them into a large circular chamber hewn from the rock. Easily thirty meters across, the chamber was empty save for a large stone crypt in the center.

  “What is this place?” Canderous whispered.

  “I think it’s the burial chamber of an ancient Sith Lord,” Revan answered. “Like the tombs on Korriban.”

  “Why would they bury him here in this frozen wasteland?”

  To his own surprise, Revan knew the answer to that question. “He was an exile. He fled here with a handful of his fanatically loyal followers many centuries ago. When he died, they carved out this secret chamber to inter him so his enemies couldn’t find and desecrate his remains.”

  “How do you know that?”

  Revan shrugged. “I just know. Malak and I came here looking for this crypt. Someone must have told us about it.”

  “You mean someone like Mandalore?”

  Another memory came crashing in on Revan, triggered by the words of his friend.

  Mandalore the Ultimate lay dying at his feet. Coughing on the blood welling up in his lungs, he reached up and peeled off his Mask, the most sacred symbol of his people.

  “It wasn’t supposed to end like this,” he said, his voice soft and low. “They promised me victory. Only now do I see how I was betrayed.”

  Revan tilted his head to the side, puzzled. “What are you talking about?”

  “They tricked me. We were never meant to win this war. They used me and my people to test the Republic’s strength.”

  “Who used you?”

  “The Sith.”

  The recollection ended abruptly, slipping quickly back into Revan’s subconscious. But in bubbling up to the surface, it had released a host of other trapped memories, and they crashed over Revan like a wave, staggering him.

  “I remember,” he muttered, placing his hand on the wall for support. “I remember.”

  “What?” Canderous asked anxiously. “What do you remember?”

  Revan didn’t answer. Instead he crossed the chamber to the sarcophagus in the center. Carved into the granite sides was an interweaving pattern of circles and diagonal lines, most likely a family crest or seal. The tomb’s heavy stone lid was smooth and unadorned, but as Revan drew closer he could see marks and scratches along the edges, signs that it had been moved several times.

  Reaching out to the Force, Revan focused on the lid. After a moment it began to move, the edge grating along the lip of the lower half of the sarcophagus as it slowly rose into the air.

  Careful not to let the heavy lid drop, he moved it off to the side and gently lowered it to the floor. Then he stepped up to the sarcophagus and peered inside.

  There were no remains to be seen. The enemies of the anonymous Sith Lord in the tomb must have found him after all, stealing his mummified corpse for some dark and twisted purpose. The missing body didn’t come as a surprise to Revan, and he suddenly remembered that he and Malak had also found the sarcophagus empty.

  But they hadn’t left it that way. Inside was a datacron—a small cube similar to the holocrons used by the Jedi and Sith to record their teachings for future generations. However, unlike those powerful artifacts, the datacron was not created using the Force; it was simply a repository of information.

  But Revan barely
looked at the datacron. His attention was gripped by the object that lay beside it: Mandalore’s Mask. And as he reached in and picked up the sacred relic, his mind flashed back to the moment he had left it there.

  “So Mandalore was telling the truth,” Malak said.

  “Did you really think his last words would be a lie?” Revan asked.

  “Now what?”

  “We have our proof,” Revan said. “The Sith are not extinct. They have to be stopped.”

  “What about the Mandalorians?”

  “Without the Mask, they are nothing,” Revan said, placing the Mask inside the empty sepulcher.

  The memory ended, rudely snapping Revan back to the present. He lifted the Mask and held it aloft so Canderous could see.

  The big man walked slowly toward him, as if in a daze. He didn’t speak, but as he approached, his hands came up almost involuntarily, his fingers reaching out toward the lost symbol of his people.

  Neither noticed Veela and the others enter the chamber.

  “How dare you defile Mandalore’s Mask with your filthy Jedi hands!” Veela shouted, breaking the spell that had momentarily enthralled the two men.

  Revan looked up to see her standing at the cavern’s entrance, flanked by the other climbers. All six Mandalorians were armed with blaster pistols, their muzzles aimed directly at the two men standing by the crypt.

  “Veela!” Canderous demanded. “What do you think you’re doing?”

  “Put the Mask down and step away from the crypt,” she commanded, ignoring him.

  Moving slowly so as not to alarm anyone, Revan placed the Mask back in the crypt.

  “Avner fought beside us,” Canderous protested. “He led us to Mandalore’s Mask. And you repay him with betrayal?”

  Veela barked out a harsh laugh. “Who are you to talk of betrayal? You turned your back on your people. And for what? To throw your lot in with Revan the Butcher?”

  “When did you figure it out?” Canderous asked, not bothering to deny the truth.

  “Once he revealed himself to be a Jedi, it was obvious,” she said with a sneer. “Especially with that name. Did you really think rearranging Revan into Avner would fool us?”