Keeper of Truth

[Saarai-kaar]

Susevfi

Emotion, yet peace.

Dardanus closed his eyes and breathed, delving through his mind in search of memory, of moments, of fragments of recollection. Every Jensaarai knew the words, half-remembered and hastily scrawled as they were: second- and third-hand repetitions of teachings that were uttered before many of them were even born. But Dardanus had more than mere relics: he had been there, decades ago, listening to Nikkos Tyris as he revealed his truth to the fledgeling Force Sensitives of Suarbi Seven-Five. He had heard the worst first-hand, but in his youth he had remembered so little, and comprehended even less. His deepest regret, given all that had been lost.

In those early days of Tyris' teachings, it had all seemed so abstract, so obscure. He had been a young man, barely man enough to lie with a woman, when Tyris had first arrived from beyond the stars. He had listened to his wisdom about darkness and light: of how both were in all things, and one could not exist without the other. He had listened to his wisdom about passion and peace: of how one bred strength, while the other bred focus, and of how every warrior needed to learn to harness both. To the Jedi, There is no Emotion, there is Peace; while to the Sith, Peace is a lie, there is only passion; both true, and both false. To Tyris there was balance, and when he spoke his words made such sense: but to Dardanus, it had been mystifying.

At least it had been, until the Jedi came. Three knights sent to purge the heathen Jensaarai from their home. The Jedi will not suffer a Sith to live. Dardanus knew not who had first uttered those words, but their truth was etched into his bones. He had cowered in the sanctum while Nikkos Tyris and the Jensaarai's two finest had sacrificed themselves to preserve the secret others. He had been trapped beneath the rubble when the zealot Jedi shattered the sanctum and buried all it contained. He had felt the pain and rage as Sukarr died, and his wife rose up to become Saarai-kaar of those who survived; and he had felt the bitter betrayal when she had sent her only son to aid the new Empire in exterminating the Jedi, only to be slain by Vader and the Inquisitors for carrying the light in his heart beside the dark - a fate that was inflicted upon the rest of the Jensaarai as well, including Dardanus' first love; a fate that left him as one of the precious few who remembered the First Teachings.

Emotion, yet peace.

He contemplated the words again. The former he had in abundance, but the latter grew more illusive with each passing day. He could recall the peace of his youth, the certainty that Tyris' guidance had offered. He could recall the strength that the Saarai-kaar had inspired in her followers, taking the words of Tyris, of Larad Noon, of Volfe Karkko, and others; twisting them from the words they were into the words the Jensaarai needed to hear. He could recall the harmony that reverberated between the Jensaarai as they fought as one, the power they all felt with each small victory that loosened the Imperial chains suppressing them.

Those recollections paled however compared to what always followed whenever he walked this mind's path. The silence that had rippled through the Force, as Hope battled the Great Darkness, and both were extinguished. The tense stillness, the inner chaos that twisted within him when the Saarai-kaar proclaimed her plan. The Empire was weakened, she had reasoned. Their Emperor dead. Their military reeling. There would never be a better time to strike. Dardanus did not know if it was cowardice or wisdom that was to blame, but he had refused, unwilling to saccrifice those sworn to him on a fool's quest to conquer the Palace. The Saarai-kaar had attacked regardless, leaving Dardanus in her wake to wrestle with the question: would they all have lived if he had helped?

Would she have lived? That was the truth of it. Not the Saarai-kaar, palpable as her loss was: for Dardanus, the failed attack on the Imperial Palace of Yumfla had cost him even more deeply. His second wife; his second great love; taken from him by the fickleness of fate and the Force. It had almost taken a son from him as well, though he had survived through some small flicker of mercy.

Some argued that it was necessary. Some argued that the loss of that which he loved so dearly - a loss echoed by their fallen Saarai-kaar - was proof of his destiny to replace her. They credited his wise hesitance in all that had come since, leading them down the Force's intended path to salvation. Since Dardanus had been declared Saarai-kaar, the Empress Miranda had purged disloyalty from her ranks, Quence's Moff among them; and then the Alliance and their Starkillers had driven out the Empire entirely, letting Susevfi taste freedom for the first time in more than forty years.

The Saarai-kaar's eyes opened, the vista before him returning to his vision. He looked out across Yumfla from the balcony of the Imperial Palace. Gazed out beyond the city fortifications towards the Wall, a solid sheet of nature that marked the edge of the domain that humanity had carved for itself within Susevfi's wilderness. Further still were the deeper jungles; the mountains; the steppes; other cities, both abandoned and not; rumours of more, even, Imperial secrets concealed beneath the moon's verdant canopies. His gaze drifted towards the clouds, and he thought of the worlds, and stars, and empires that lay beyond, all vying for power, struggling to find their place in the new reality. Susevfi would need to be part of that one day, he realised, but not yet.

There were many hard decisions to be made between now and then.

His attention shifted, but his body did not. A presence. A sharpness of emotion, needling into his spine like a knife. It was all too familiar these last days; and it left a sadness in it's wake.

"You disapprove," the Saarai-kaar stated quietly, releasing a gentle sigh to drift out into the Susevfian air.

[Marhaus]

Marhaus tensed as his father spoke. It was a subconscious reaction, one he wished he could evade; but he felt everything that drifted beneath every word. No matter what he did, no matter what he achieved and continued to strive towards, Marhaus knew exactly what he would always be: a reminder. Old words uttered in his childhood lodged themselves within his mind, echoing with every disapproving word his father ever uttered. You remind me so much like your mother. So much pain and sadness an that sentiment, but it grew worse: transformed into a knife in Marhaus' chest.

I wish that you did not.

It was more than that, of course. Above the deep and underlying sorrow that Marhaus inspired in his father, there were his own failings to worsen matters. Worse than failure: a broken promise. Six years ago, the galactic Emperor freshly dead, the Jensaarai had rallied to strike at the Imperial Palace: a decisive blow to drive the Empire from their homes so that they might all live in peace. His father had advised against it, refused to throw his support behind what he rightly foresaw as a massacre waiting to happen. Marhaus' stepmother however, she was not so cautious; and Marhaus himself was merely overconfident. In protest of her husband, his step-mother had followed the Saarai-kaar into death: and Marhaus had utterly failed in his vow to his father to keep her safe.

Marhaus was never quite sure what his father blamed him for more: allowing her to die, or not dying himself. Either way, it was the looks from his father that hurt more than the burns and near-death scars ever could.

He forced himself to resemble that which he had made himself. A straighter posture. A confident soldier. Armoured in Susevfian cortosis of his own making, a hand resting idly against the lightsaber that hung from his belt. He was, every foot and every inch, the perfect picture of a Jensaari warrior. Strong. Capable. Obedient without question. Loyal to a fault. It should have been enough. Should have been all that was needed to earn his father's pride. Instead, every word, every look was tainted. He was everything his father could possibly have wanted to be - except that he was also his mother's son, and always would be.

"It is not my place to question my Saarai-kaar," he replied, his voice confident and resolute.

[Saarai-kaar]

A faint smile, and a faint breath of laughter, both bitter as they manifested from the Saarai-kaar.

"It is not," Dardanus agreed. "And yet, you disapprove."

He turned slowly, just enough for his eldest son to enter into the periphery of his vision. A fine figure of a man. A good man. A good son. One of the finest Defenders under Dardanus' command; one he could rely on to follow orders no matter how he felt about them. It was true that Marhaus never questioned - perhaps even when sometimes he should - but one of the many curses of having the Force flowing through your veins was the impossibility of hiding that which you wished to conceal. It was agony for a father and son: all the comforting lies exposed for what they were, and every stern word and punishment reflected back upon you.

The Saarai-kaar could feel it, taste it even. He could feel the knot of protest longing to be unfurled, and uttered from Marhaus' lips. Perhaps part of Dardanus even wanted it: perhaps part of him longed to have his son speak out and hold him accountable. Dardanus did not question his decisions, he did not doubt his choices - but no one did. He had been the voice of protest in the ear of the previous Saarai-kaar, but no one offered the same -

He stopped his thoughts before the lie could fully form. He knew the deeper truth: his head was far more eager and open to dissent than his heart was. That voice had been there, vocal and outspoken, and the Saarai-kaar had found a way to force it into silence.

And yet it was necessary. Dardanus was certain of it. Perhaps this was why he longed for Marhaus to challenge it: the opportunity to state his case, to justify the necessity so that it could exist and be known somewhere beyond the confines of his own mind.

"I had to." The Saarai-kaar tried to precipitate the argument for himself. "He was dangerous."

[Marhaus]

He was your son.

Marhaus did not need to be reminded: he had been there, witnessed it for himself. The Jedi taught that the dark side was dangerous. They described the Force as a safe path, skirting the edge of an abyss into which it was all too easy to fall. And fall Marhaus' younger brother did: not into darkness perhaps, but into emotion.

In truth, Marhaus had never quite liked the boy. Zhol had been the child of his father's second wife. A new family with his new love; a replacement for Marhaus and his mother; a sign of his father moving on with his life, seeking to leave the past behind. Marhaus had felt threatened, and young Zhol made it all too easy for that to transform into antagonism. Everything that Marhaus was, every skill and trait that he possessed, Zhol lacked in entirety. Reckless, overconfident, disobedient, clumsy: all of those things and more. Marhaus could feel the disappointment that Zhol inspired in their father; he resented it, because the Saarai-kaar never took the step of acknowledging how Marhaus was the better son. Zhol was no Defender. He would never be a Defender; never be good enough to stand among the Jensaarai; and yet their father allowed him to continue to try and fail, out of some sense of responsibility to his freshest lost love.

Yet, for all the ill will that Marhaus bore towards his brother, he was your son. Marhaus had seen, and envied the love their father once had for Zhol; he'd seen it fade and dwindle as disappointment outweighed love. He'd seen it turn to blame, Zhol's failures somehow seen with malicious intent, and Marhaus couldn't help wondering: had his father's affection for him undergone the same transformation and decline? Was he, like his brother, only one mistake away from being stricken from their father's heart entirely?

"I understand, Saarai-kaar."

A single beat passed.

"You had orders for me?"