Star Wars: Lost Tribe of the Sith: The Collected Stories

by John Jackson Miller

  A quarter century earlier, Hilts had famously coined the term for the age, but it hadn’t required much imagination. “The Time of the Rot” was visible everywhere. Under successive sieges, the rich streets of Tahv decayed. Left untended, towering aqueducts clogged and overflowed; the morning’s calamity was an all-too-familiar occurrence. Far to the south, the Sessal Spire raged as it never had in Keshiri memory, unleashing an explosion so thunderous that one face of the great arena, the Korsinata, collapsed. It was as if the planet itself were fighting back against its émigrés from beyond.

  But nestled in a small corner of the eroding marble of the capital building, one place had remained free of neglect: the office of the Caretaker. Amid all the battles between Grand Lords and Antilords, only it had remained untouched.

  It wasn’t because the Sith had any fear of sacrilege. Varner Hilts’s office, outside the traditional power structure, had been established in Nida Korsin’s time to provide the Tribe with accurate timekeeping and a historical archive. It was a lifetime appointment, in part because so few candidates were interested. No one desired the Caretaker’s lot; his only followers were a roomful of Keshiri clerks, unsuited for service in anyone’s army. Not that Hilts was ever actually in demand. A historical polymath, he had been told early on that with his lightsaber skills, he need never worry about a treacherous ally. No one would dare stand near him, for fear of accidental dismemberment.

  Stepping from the anteroom into the beaders’ hall, Hilts again heard the clickety-clack that had greeted him for half his life. Seated on their knees in a semicircle, brown-clad Keshiri worked at handheld counting frames constructed from seashells and young hejarbo shoots. Hilts discarded his dripping cape and strode through the room, barely wondering what they were working on today. Jaye kept the figurers busy, most of the time, calculating dates to go along with the bits of trivia Hilts scraped from the archives. He’d often marveled at their precision. For a species that lacked basic mathematics when Omen crashed, the Keshiri had embraced calculation as vigorously as they had all their other arts.

  Grabbing an abacus from a co-worker, Jaye followed Hilts into the sunlit atrium. Centuries before, the first Grand Lord, Yaru Korsin, had watched his nephew Jariad dueling here—knowing even then, Hilts suspected, that Jariad was planning to betray him. Now the Sandpipes dominated the room. Silently tended by watchful tan-clad Keshiri girls, the towering network of powder-filled glass vials kept time for the Tribe. As if time could be bottled up, Hilts thought, scratching the side of his face.

  “I want to be able to see my reflection in those pipes,” he ordered. “I don’t have to tell you what a big day we have coming up.”

  He didn’t. The workers shined the massive device more urgently, careful not to interfere with its functioning. For the first time in their young lives, visitors were coming to their place of work. No Grand Lord or pretender had lived in the palace for six hundred years; Korsin’s architects had designed for beauty, not defense. Testament Day was the only time the building saw visitors.

  Every twenty-five years, on the anniversary of Korsin’s death, listeners heard his final testament again. Fifty years earlier, Hilts had been a boy, not allowed into the palace—but the idea of communing with the past had captured his imagination. Through study and toil, he had made certain that, when the next Testament Day arrived, he would be the one to manage the event.

  Now, like a comet, the day had come around yet again. But the palace today was a much shabbier place, beyond his resources to repair. Glancing at the cracks in the smoked-glass windows in the ceiling, Hilts just couldn’t get excited.

  Jaye didn’t have that problem. “They’ve confirmed it, Caretaker!” the Keshiri squeaked, abacus shaking in his hand. “My calculations about the Sandpipes—”

  “—Aren’t important right now,” Hilts said, “unless you intend to grab a cloth and help clean them.” He regarded the young women at their work. At least some parts of the room would look good. “We’ve got twelve days. We’ll be ready.”

  The clerk bit his lip. “Can we really be ready? This … this is a mystical convergence. No—a holy one.”

  Hilts rolled his eyes. Jaye didn’t just love his numbers; he feared them, too. This year was a first for the Tribe. Testament Day wasn’t the only such memorial—and Yaru wasn’t the only Korsin. Daughter Nida had reigned for a record seventy-nine years after her father, and her elevation to Grand Lord was commemorated with a monthlong festival on the grounds outside the palace every seventy-nine years. Even Hilts hadn’t been around for the last one.

  “Don’t you see, Caretaker?” Abacus shells rattled as Jaye worked another calculation. “It’s been one thousand nine hundred seventy-five years since Grand Lord Korsin transcended this existence and Nida succeeded him—and that’s seventy-nine times twenty-five! This is the first time Testament Day and Nida’s Rise have ever fallen in the same year!” Eyes darting to the side, he lowered his voice to a whisper. “The first time, ever.”

  “Ever!” Hilts clutched his pale purple companion by the shoulders in mock seriousness, causing Jaye to drop his counting frame to the stone floor. “So what you’re telling me—is that we’ll save on wine this time!” Hilts released Jaye and slapped his cheek lightly. “We don’t need any more omens, Jaye. We’ve got one, up on the mountain, remember? And no one’s allowed inside that.”

  Hilts walked toward his private office, leaving his aide to stare blankly at the abacus.

  “But, Caretaker—”

  “Overreacting, Jaye.”

  “But what about what I learned about the Sandpipes?”

  “Don’t start that again!” Hilts stepped into his office and looked with relief at his chair. Yes, that was the answer. After a morning like this, it would be a relief to sit in silence and drink some—

  Voices rose outside in the atrium. Slamming his half-filled glass down to the desk in disgust, Hilts yelled over his shoulder at the commotion. “Jaye, I told you to quiet down!”

  “That’s funny,” responded a husky female voice. “I just told him the same thing.” Hilts turned to see a black-clad woman in her late twenties, holding a gleaming red lightsaber just beneath Jaye’s neck. Golden eyes alive with dark intelligence, she spoke. “We have to talk, Caretaker—and I hate being interrupted.”

  She stood a full two meters, easily taller than Hilts. Bright red hair, neatly coiffed; flawless pink skin. She would have fared well in Seelah Korsin’s inspections, centuries before, Hilts thought. And that was the whole point.

  The intruder led Hilts back to the atrium, where he saw half a dozen similarly clad women, all perfect specimens of humanity themselves, threatening the huddled workers with lightsabers. She spoke again. “Of course, you know me.”

  “Only by reputation,” he said, throat sandy. He’d never gotten to taste his drink. “I don’t get out much.”

  “I can see that.” The woman smiled primly and deactivated her lightsaber. “Iliana Merko. And these are my fellow Sisters of Seelah.”

  “I don’t think Seelah Korsin had any sisters,” Hilts said, regarding the beauties guarding his Keshiri.

  “Sisters in spirit.” Iliana strode confidently ahead, crushing Jaye’s abacus underfoot as she did. The mathematician was with the others, now, prone on the floor but safe. Boot heels clacking against the marble, Iliana surveyed the glass statues lining the atrium. All depicted either Yaru or Nida Korsin. Iliana didn’t look pleased.

  “Sorry,” Hilts said. “They took out the Seelah statues after—after what happened, years ago.” He assumed she knew about the failed coup Seelah had plotted with Jariad against her husband, Yaru. To members of Iliana’s faction, it was like yesterday. “I don’t think they kept any Seelah pieces at all.”

  “I’m not surprised. No one gave our lady the respect she deserved. She founded the Tribe, you know—not these traitors.” Glaring at a glass representation of Yaru Korsin, Iliana’s expression melted to puzzlement. “Did he really look like that?”
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  “Back then, the Keshiri sculptors were still figuring out how to get human eyes right.” Hilts cautiously stepped toward her. The woman didn’t seem to be in any hurry, and he chose to think that boded well for his survival. But then, it wasn’t as if she was going to be interrupted. Who ever came here?

  “You know why I’m here,” she said, facing him.

  “The Testament won’t be read for twelve days yet. Why are you here now?”

  She stepped briskly toward him. “We have to talk about what Korsin’s Testament says,” she said. “Before the others arrive.”

  Hilts couldn’t help but laugh. “You know what the Testament says. Everyone does. It’s been transcribed so many times—”

  Iliana charged forward, igniting her lightsaber and waving the tip just under the Caretaker’s hairy chin. “Of course we know! But this is different. This Testament Day, this reading—somehow, it’s become a conclave.”

  His eyes narrowed. “The Pantheon’s Peace.”

  “Exactly.”

  It suddenly made sense to Hilts. For centuries, Testament Day and the reading had been the one time that the Tribe’s entire hierarchy met peaceably under one roof—that of the palace atrium—to hear their late founder’s words spoken. Even after the Sith splintered, deference to the great leaders of the past had been enough to bring the various faction leaders together at one time. No one dared make the meeting an opportunity for mayhem; some now regarded Korsin almost as a magical being, able to influence events from beyond the grave. Their forebears had walked in the stars.

  “All my rivals will be here,” Iliana said, still threatening with the lightsaber. “Some believe that in the Testament, they’ll hear support for their cause—an endorsement from a dead man.” She looked back up at the statue and sneered. “Well, we all know what it is—a boring old speech rewarding his allies for helping him thwart Seelah.”

  Hilts swallowed. No, Iliana and her allies wouldn’t find much to like in Korsin’s dying speech. The leader had only mentioned Seelah to banish her. Some of the other groups might find some support for their own claims to power in Korsin’s words—but the Sisters wouldn’t.

  “That’s why, old man, I want you to change what’s in the Testament.” Iliana closed the remaining few footsteps between them and looked down on the Caretaker. She smiled. “Change it—to favor us.”

  He held her gaze for a moment. “You’re serious.”

  “Deadly.” Twirling, she stepped away, dousing her lightsaber again. “I know about you, Wilts—”

  “That’s Hilts.”

  “—you and your little workers here exist to dig up worthless trivia. Well,” she said, turning, “you’re going to reveal that you’ve discovered the true Testament—one declaring that Seelah and those who follow her teachings today are the legitimate heirs to power on Kesh.”

  One of Iliana’s comrades produced a scroll and shoved it at Hilts. Unspooling it, he goggled. “I don’t think this will work.”

  “Oh, it will,” Iliana said. “The others are superstitious—all invoking one figure from our history or another. They’re in awe of our ancestors born on high—and they’re right to be. But they don’t respect the one they should.” She gestured to the parchment in Hilts’s hands. “That’ll change when you read that instead of the Korsin Testament. The simpler-minded will believe it, and follow me. That should be enough.”

  Hilts exhaled, barely stifling a laugh. He regarded the woman, so full of energy and cleverness—all spent to no avail whatsoever.

  No, of course she wouldn’t know, he thought. She’s too young.

  Iliana stared at him. “What?”

  “I’m sorry,” Hilts said, gesturing to the scroll. “I admire your initiative, Iliana Merko. But there’s a reason no one’s tried this before. You wouldn’t know, unless you’d been here for a Testament reading—or spoken with someone who was.”

  “What in blazes are you talking about?”

  Slowly so as not to cause alarm, Hilts stepped to the right of the Sandpipes and approached a covered pedestal. “You see, I don’t read Korsin’s Testament. The Caretakers never do.”

  Iliana watched, puzzled, as he returned with something wrapped in rich fabric. “Then who reads it?”

  “Yaru Korsin does.” Hilts pulled back the cloth, revealing a small pyramid-shaped object. A device—in a city that had none …

  2

  “This … is amazing.”

  “It’s not good, Caretaker.”

  “I didn’t say it was,” Hilts responded to his aide. “But it’s still amazing.”

  As Kesh’s sun cast its first rays onto the city, Hilts and Jaye looked down upon the palace grounds from the balcony. They’d never seen the city so alive. A writhing carpet of humans and Keshiri blanketed what had once been the Circle Eternal, with people setting up portable shelters for protection against volcanic rain.

  Celebrants began gathering the day after Iliana and her warriors had entered the palace, all staking locations in preparation for the Festival of Nida’s Rise. None of the regular citizens would be allowed in for the Testament reading, but it didn’t seem to matter. “This is a planet that needs a party,” Hilts said.

  “They want a leader,” Jaye responded. Dark eyes looked up at the Caretaker. “That’s what I heard Iliana saying. All the humans hope some guidance will come from the Grand Lord’s words.”

  Hilts chortled. “Well, at least they’ll be his words.” He shot a glance back into the palace, where Iliana and her companions stared in stupefaction at the ornate pyramid. “They’ll never even figure out how to turn it on.” That much was true, Hilts remembered; he had barely gotten the thing working during the last Testament Day, twenty-five years earlier. His predecessor had described it as a recording device, and had passed to him the ancient secret for activating it—but it had taken four tries for Hilts to get it right on the appointed day. He wondered if something was wrong with it. Would it play this year?

  No matter. He had played the last four days pretty well, Hilts thought. To buy time, he’d lied to Iliana that the device only activated on Testament Day. That hadn’t stopped the arrogant woman from fiddling with it, to no avail—but the ploy had brought the relief he’d hoped for. Along with the revelers, Iliana’s rivals had entered Tahv far ahead of schedule, evidently attracted by their spies’ reports that the Sisters of Seelah had taken the palace. Now, out there in the encampments flew the banners of the Korsinites, the Golden Destiny, Force 57, and countless other factions. Seelah’s vanguard had taken station outside the palace entrance, but it wasn’t clear how long they could bar entry with their opponents’ numbers growing. With eight days remaining before Testament Day, the blood enemies had held off on violence, instead using the mass public gathering as a chance to proselytize. Nida’s Rise had become a festival of blather.

  “Looking for a leader in this bunch,” Hilts said, “may the dark side help us all.”

  “The conjunction,” Jaye said. Hilts was afraid he was about to hear another round about Jaye’s theory, and what today really was, when the Keshiri sighed and looked directly at him. “Caretaker, I’ll never understand why you never challenged to rule the Tribe. You’re wiser in the ways of the ancient Protectors than anyone.”

  “Too wise,” Hilts said, amused. “These are the days of the Flagrant Fool, my friend. Knowledgeable men like us can’t get far.”

  “But the Tribe teaches that every free man or woman can grow up to become Grand Lord.”

  “Which is a fine thing for me to believe,” Hilts said. “But if you believe it, it isn’t as fine. And if those fools out there believe it as well,” he continued, gesturing to the crowd, “it becomes a horrible thing. Your opportunity lies in my failure.” He smirked. “And what’s this ‘Tribe teaches’? No one agrees on what the Tribe is even about anymore.” The schooling system had been just another victim of the upheaval. Under Korsin and his successors, people had worked together. But as individuals increasingly sought shor
tcuts to sole power, Sith society—if it could be called that—had fallen apart. Hilts clapped his hand on the young aide’s shoulder. “No, it’s too late. Like Donellan, time has passed me by.”

  “I don’t agree—”

  “Listen, Jaye. When a man of advancing years tells you something is true, either believe him, or nod politely,” Hilts said, stepping away from the railing. “The last thing you want to do is shake his faith in his omniscience.”

  “Even if he’s wrong?”

  “Especially if he’s wrong.” He turned to step back inside the palace. “And speaking of fools …”

  Inside, Iliana continued to paw at the little pyramid. Only two of her companions remained, the rest having departed to guard the entrance.

  “If it’s some kind of recording device,” Iliana said, “it must have a power source. Perhaps a Lignan crystal.”

  “If you find out how it works,” Hilts said, “you’ll be one for the historical records yourself.” He crossed to an unthreatening position near the Sandpipes. After locking his workers in another room, Iliana had kept the Caretaker and his assistant in the immediate area, ready to answer questions. Hilts wasn’t going anywhere, anyway. The whole thing had become an amusing spectacle—and the players, fun to watch.

  He’d found Iliana a fetching woman, if completely venal and untrustworthy. Hilts had never taken a mate, partially because of his dead-end station, but also because he knew that Sith didn’t know how to share. He’d seen it in the histories time and again: all that envy and plotting, even within families. No wonder Yaru Korsin had decreed that the consorts of expired Grand Lords needed to be put to death. Poison had no place in the bedchamber.