He laughed once, a throaty chuckle that made Ori smile. “No, I guess not,” he said. “At least it keeps people in my line of work busy.”
The seven High Lords were always trying to outdo one another in decorating their boxes at the games. Taking the design of her mother’s booth into her own hands eight months earlier, Ori had learned about Jelph and his secret garden from one of the Keshiri florists of Tahv—if indirectly. Sensing a lie when the Keshiri claimed that the flowers were his own, Ori followed him on her uvak one day. The flying beasts still forbidden to the Keshiri, the florist had traveled on foot to meet a caravan of carts bringing fertilizer from the Marisota. She found Jelph—and had found him again many times since, except when he was away on his raft, up in the jungle.
The jungle. Ori looked over the trellis to the green hills, climbing away to the smoldering peaks of the east. Even the Tribe didn’t go up into that tangle of underbrush and overhanging foliage. “No sane person should go there,” Jelph had said. But what he brought back on his little barge was the secret to his horticultural success—and the successes of all his customers along the line. “By the time the runoff comes downstream,” he’d explained once, digging his hands into a mound of soil, “a lot of the nutrients are gone.” Ori had lain awake nights imagining the man waist-deep in a dark mountain stream, shoveling muck into his flatboat.
Silliness. A hedonistic excess. But she was Sith, wasn’t she? Who else should she please?
Kneeling, he arranged the cuttings neatly upon a cloth draped across the ground. Large, dirt-stained hands worked with surprising gentleness, prying away the buds that had come to nothing. Jelph looked at her keenly. “You know, I can give you the names of my customers closer to Tahv. They’re growing their plants in the same dirt.”
“Yours are better,” she said. That much was true. Perhaps the flowers simply grew better in air closer to their native soil. Maybe it was the workmanship of a human, rather than a Keshiri.
Or maybe it was this human. When she’d met him, she’d imagined Jelph had only recently become a slave. No laborer she’d met, human or Keshiri, had his vocabulary. He must have been someone before, back in the Sith cities. But he’d answered without hesitation: “I’m nobody. I never knew anybody, before you.” He’d been born into slavery, and there he’d stay. He, and whatever children he might ever have.
The human slave class had developed soon after the Korsin line ended. While many of Omen’s descendants were Force-sensitive, those who weren’t had formed their own layer of society beneath those who served the Grand Lord. Free members of the Tribe, this yeomanry helped to keep the Keshiri, who stood at the very bottom, productive. But when any Sith citizen stood condemned by a Lord, birthright could be lost forever. Jelph of Marisota had no surname because his father had none to give. He was better than a Keshiri—she’d never let one of the purple-skinned serfs call her by her first name—but only because he was human, not because he was Sith. Jelph owed fealty and service to the Sith, should they want it, but only Ori had ever prevailed upon him directly for anything.
Such a waste, she thought, admiring both worker and workmanship. “You know, my mother’s a High Lord.”
“You’ve mentioned it.”
“She’s powerful, but the traditions are so strong,” she said. “It’s a shame there isn’t some kind of path for you to get back in.”
“I never was in,” he said. “And what would I do in Tahv? I’d hardly fit with your beautiful people.” Looking up at her, he winked. In the sunlight, she could see the long, ruddy scar running from his right cheek down his neck. She’d sometimes imagined it as being from some great battle, rather than some farm accident, years ago. But he was right. Even if he had his name, his disfigurement would make him an ill fit for the Tribe.
Jelph stood abruptly.
“You are going to roll those up,” she said, eyes darting between him and the flowers.
“Actually, I have something for you,” he said, pointing a thumb behind him. “In honor of your Day of Dispossession.”
“That’s ‘Dispossessed.’ ”
“Begging your pardon.” He led her farther into the farm than she’d been before, past the mounds to a structure she’d seen only from the sky. Situated near the riverbank, the hut was larger than his dwelling and twice the height.
Ori blanched. “What’s back there? It stinks!”
“Manure usually does. Uvak are pretty rank,” he said, approaching the barred door. Once a stable for a previous occupant who could own uvak, now it provided him a wind-free place to store the loads of dung he needed for mixing his soil. “You don’t want to be around when I have that stuff carted in.” He opened the door.
“Surely this isn’t your gift to me,” she said, squinting and covering her nose.
“Surely not.” He reached inside the doorway to retrieve a strange-looking yoke. “It’s something I was working on. I lengthened some waterskins and attached them to part of an uvak harness.” Balancing the center straps on his hands, he showed her how the long pouches hung to either side. “You’ve always had to fly the dalsas back in a moist cloth. With these, you can carry them straight—and you won’t be soaked when you get home.”
Ori opened her eyes wide, even as he shut the door to the rancid place. “You made that for me?”
Jelph looked around. “Hmm. I don’t see the Grand Lord here today, so … sure. I guess it’s for you.”
They walked back along the riverside, past the little gornk-shell flatboat tied at the bank. Returning from its grazing, Shyn, Ori’s uvak, flew in from above and settled in a clearing. Jelph strode assuredly toward the animal and lifted the yoke over its leathery frame. A perfect fit. Shyn, who took to no one, nodded passively.
This is why I come here, Ori thought. Life at court was cutthroat—this month, more than most times. But so many were motivated not by lust for power, but by fear of losing what power they had. This man had nothing and feared nothing.
Her mother had given it a name: the Confidence of the Dead End.
Jelph partially filled the skins with water and then deposited the clippings inside. Shyn looked like a parade animal now, festooned with flowers. That might be an idea for sometime, Ori thought—but not for tomorrow. She watched as he fastened the tops to protect the blossoms.
“There. Fit for the Grand Lord.” He helped her aboard the uvak.
“Jelph,” she said, looking down. “With what you can do, you really ought to be teaching the Keshiri how to grow things. Not selling them dirt.”
“Careful,” he said, gesturing toward the composting barn. “My life’s in that dirt.” He patted Shyn’s long face and turned toward his flatboat, bobbing in the water. “And I may not be of the Tribe, but at least I’ve got a ship.” He laughed. “Such as it is!”
2
The Sith did have a ship, Ori knew, but she’d never seen it. No one alive had. One of Yaru Korsin’s last acts was to remove everyone from the lofty retreat to Tahv, where the newcomers could expand their numbers and reach. Aerial sentries perpetually protected the holy and forbidden Temple from violators, Sith and otherwise. But the mountain was always visible over Tahv’s now-useless protective walls, a reminder of their stellar origins.
Ori could see the peak clearly from her mother’s new luxury compartment in the Korsinata. Multiple stadium decks rose over a pentagonal playing field, with the Grand Lord’s section highest of all. Just that morning, Ori’s mother had been awarded a coveted section in the stadium near the Grand Lord, whose balcony always faced the Temple.
“Closer to the stars,” Ori said under her breath. We’re moving up.
She studied the horizon. There, kilometers away, Omen sat in its protective building, waiting for the day when the Sith came for their lost tribe. But no one had come, and few explanations for why were attractive. The legendary Sith Lord Naga Sadow would have found them by now, had he won his war. If the Sith and Jedi had wiped each other out, no one might ever come.
&
nbsp; And what if the Jedi had won? As she had on the farm, Ori blanched just to think of it. She knew what Jedi were only from her teachers, who’d kept the story alive. Ori knew enough to hate the Jedi and everything they stood for. Weakness. Pity. Self-denial. Discovery by Jedi would be a cruel fate, indeed.
But the worst thing about the passage of time had been the realization that, in their attempts to get off-world, those same pioneers of legend from a millennium earlier had squandered most of the resources that could have helped the Tribe now. Plenty of Lignan crystals from Omen’s hold circulated, but they were good for lightsabers and little else. And any understanding of how Omen worked had faded; it was now the province of scholars who no longer had access to the vessel. Only the Grand Lord could reverse Korsin’s ban and return the Tribe’s eyes to space.
It wouldn’t be this Grand Lord, the biggest nothing ever to hold the position. Ori seethed as she looked across to the withered crone in her ornately decorated stall. Lillia Venn rocked in her throne, her palsied hand moving completely out of time with the tempo of the musicians playing below. Grand Lord Venn had been a compromise candidate a year earlier, when the other six High Lords had been unable to agree on a new leader. The oldest High Lord by twenty years, Venn was past fearing; no one had imagined she would last. The rival political parties, distinguished by the red and gold sashes they wore, swore fealty to the woman while continuing to plot their next steps. This Grand Lord was a corpse-in-waiting.
“Don’t forget to salute, darling.”
Ori looked back into the dark eyes of Candra Kitai. Vibrant for her fifty years, the newest High Lord approached the railing, turned primly toward the royal booth, and bowed. When the Grand Lord did not respond, Candra’s face drew so tight Ori feared it might crack wide open.
“Easy, Mom,” Ori said. “Like you told me, it’s our big day.” Months earlier, Ori’s mother had taken Venn’s place among the seven High Lords, instantly becoming the second most important person in the Tribe. By keeping her preferences regarding the rival factions private, Candra had become the tiebreaker: the one ultimately to select the aged leader’s successor.
Recognizing Candra’s new importance, Venn had given her the section nearby, in range of even her feeble eyes. If treated well, Candra could keep the other High Lords stalemated indefinitely, fending off all challenges.
And then? Who knows, Ori thought. By next Donellan’s Day, we might be in the royal box.
Her own rivals among the Saber leadership, the Luzo brothers, flanked the Grand Lord. The barrel-chested pair glared back at Ori, barely concealing their disdain. Probably annoyed, she thought, because this was the one moment when they wouldn’t be able to sabotage her. They’d been watching her for months, eager to profit from any slip. With any luck, the end of Venn would be the end of the Luzos, too.
“Easy, dear,” Candra prompted, catching her thought. “We’re all friends today.” The newest High Lord turned and nodded to the leaders of the two rival factions, seated in their customary red and gold boxes. High Lords Dernas and Pallima were as important to her as the Grand Lord was—and she, to them.
“Friends. Right.” Ori rolled her eyes.
“But our booth looks lovely. A fine job, again.”
Reminded, Ori turned her gaze to something more pleasing—the dalsa flowers, fresh and vibrant on the balcony. Jelph of Marisota might never appear here, but at least some part of him had made the trip.
Thunder came from below. Ori looked down to see the riders, wearing the ancient garb of Nida Korsin’s Skyborn Rangers, entering the field with their crippled uvak. Harshest of all bloodsports on Kesh, rake-riding even began with gore. The wing muscles of uvak hatchlings were cut, permanently grounding them while preserving some range of movement. With glass prongs screwed into their tough wing edges, the fully grown creatures stalked around, their flopping wings transformed into dangerous weapons.
Squinting, Ori tried to identify the riders. Dernas and his Reds had their favorites out there, as did Pallima and the Golds. Venn had two entries, promoted by the Luzo brothers. The last to enter the field, however, was the one Ori cared about: Campion Dey, uvak wrangler from the southlands that Candra represented. Dey saluted Ori and her mother.
“He’ll do well, I think,” Ori commented.
“He’ll die,” Candra said.
Ori looked back, surprised. Candra settled into her comfortable chair, indifferent to the drums beating below. Searching her mother’s face, Ori realized the truth. These sporting events were always succession struggles by proxy. The rival factions might try to win Candra’s favor by allowing her entry to win, but the newest High Lord wasn’t going to agitate Grand Lord Venn. Not today.
“We’re going to have to win sometime,” Ori grumbled.
“Not today,” Candra said. Campion Dey was as good as dead.
The shell-horn sounding, the field dissolved immediately into a cloud of dust and blood. There was no strategy to rake-riding, no posturing. The riders had their lightsabers, but anyone with sense minded the reins and nothing else. Like any Saber, Ori loved a good fight—but this was nothing more than a brawl with animals: titans, lurching about, ripping into one another.
And her family’s entry was simply there to dress the place, no better than the flowers in the—
“Look!”
All eyes turned to Campion Dey, whose uvak reared back suddenly on its clawed feet. It charged ahead, razor-tipped wings outstretched. But instead of goring the opponent stumbling haplessly before it, the creature leapt …
… and flew. Wings that shouldn’t work pumped mightily, allowing uvak and rider to bound from the melee toward the grandstands.
Dey, standing in his saddle, raised his red lightsaber and screamed something Ori couldn’t hear. He was in control, all right. Lighting her own weapon, Ori leapt atop the railing, ready to pounce if he came near. But the lumbering behemoth passed to the left, awkwardly clawing its way upward through the panicked crowd toward the Grand Lord’s luxury compartment, above.
Ori saw Lillia Venn stand, unflinching, as the attacker scaled the stone bleachers toward her. Raising her shaking hands, the Grand Lord unleashed a torrent of dark side energy. Blue fire crackling all along its wingspan, the surprised animal fell backward onto the lower seating, throwing its rider free. The Luzos leapt from the royal box, their own weapons red blurs as they plunged toward the would-be assassin.
“Mother, get back!” Ori yelled.
Across the way, a Keshiri aide closed the shutters to the Grand Lord’s compartment. Ori now did the same, knocking over large vases of Jelph’s flowers in the process. She turned back to see her mother, staggering, paralyzed before the spectacle.
“What happened, Mother?” They’d known Campion Dey for years, supporting his training. What could have caused his mad act?
Candra simply shook her head, blood draining from a face that had looked youthful only moments before. “You … you’d better go, Ori.”
“The other Sabers are dealing with Dey,” Ori said, guarding the entrance to the compartment.
“That’s not what I mean.”
Ori looked at her mother, stunned. “We didn’t do this. We don’t have anything to worry about. Do we?” She took the older woman’s arm. “Mother, do we?”
Summoning some unseen reserve of calm, Candra straightened. “I don’t know what just happened. But I will know, one way or another.” She stepped past her daughter and opened the door. Outside, Sith and Keshiri dashed madly down the Korsinata’s exterior ramps.
“Mother!”
Candra looked back with sad eyes. “I can’t talk now, Ori. Just get to the estate and make sure the slaves know I won’t be coming home tonight.” She disappeared into the crowd.
A star fell harmlessly from the sky. Landing on a hill, it provided light through the night, causing the gardens of Kesh to flourish as never before.
Until it rose again, setting everything afire. The stones of Ori’s home fell to dust before
the hot wind, exposing her to the inferno. Charred and dying, she’d chased the star into the jungle to ask why it had destroyed her world. It answered: “Because you thought me a friend.”
Ori had experienced the Force vision during her second day as a Tyro, the lowest level in the Tribe’s hierarchy. It had never meant anything to her. But arriving at Starfall, her mother’s country estate south of Tahv, she’d had occasion to remember it. A procession of Keshiri laborers was exiting the marbled mansion, carrying belongings to a pyre on the lawn.
Her laborers. Her belongings.
Leaving Shyn by the columns lining the front walk, Ori ran toward the bonfire. Drawing her lightsaber, she charged the frail purple figure directing the work: her mother’s caretaker.
“What’s going on?” Ori grabbed the man. “Who told you to do this?”
Recognizing his mistress’s daughter, the Keshiri looked furtively to either side before touching Ori’s wrist. He spoke in a low whisper. “This was ordered by the Grand Lord herself, milady. Just a couple of hours ago.”
A couple of hours ago? Ori shook her head. The assassination attempt had only been two hours earlier. How was any of this possible?
The caretaker gestured to the main entrance. There, two apprentices of the Luzo brothers stood in the grand doorway, watching the furniture-laden workers pass. They hadn’t noticed her yet, Ori saw—but she’d change that. Ori took a step toward the house.
Clutching at her arm, the old man yanked Ori back. “There are more of them inside,” he said, pulling her behind the fire and out of their view. “They’re taking your mother’s things, too.”
“Is she still a High Lord?” Ori asked.
The caretaker looked down.
Another thought struck her. “Am I still a Saber?”
Suddenly sickened, Ori staggered closer to the flames and tried to remember what she’d heard and seen on the way out of the Korsinata. There had been so much chaos. With Campion Dey killed seconds after his failed attack, rumors were attributing his act everywhere. The Red faction claimed her mother had made a dire pact with the Golds, and vice versa. Some claimed Venn had died in her box, succumbing to her exertions and the excitement; others reported seeing the executions of High Lords Dernas and Pallima, right in their boxes at the arena. None of it made sense.
Star Wars: Lost Tribe of the Sith: The Collected Stories Page 12