Kashyyyk

[Telperiën Ar-Pharazon]

Tel laughed hoarsely which ended in a coughing fit as the Ravenhammer exited hyperspace. She covered her mouth with her arm as the coughing fit continued until she was teary eyed and retching. Embarrassed, she swallowed the blood that had come with the cough instead of spitting it out. Crestfallen, she followed the older girl into the cockpit and was amazed at the lightshow. The duel daggers of the two Victories dished amazing sheets of Green fire towards a distant enemy as the two girls strapped themselves into the crash webbing. Since she didn’t like the feeling of her feet dangling over the floor, Telperiën sat cross legged in the giant chair instead.

 

A heavy presence almost overwhelmed her as a slimy sensation crawled up her spine. A hunger, calling, begging, desiring them. The Lord of the Krath called and Telperiën was hesitant to answer. She shivered and tapped the side of her head when she caught Raia’s eye.

 

Dangerous I think. But something we can learn from?

[Telperiën Ar-Pharazon]

Tel shook her head violently, causing the black braids to bounce about her shoulders. “I don’t much like the idea of getting that slimy hutt’s presence in me, and Dad doesn’t want me to either.” She looked curiously at the older Dathomiri, “What’s a Crath? I don’t know what kind of Sith factions there are, but I like the sneaky stuff mom does.”

 

Something stirred deep in her chest and the hairs on the back of her neck stood on end. The voices wove their words about her, beckoning her to join the call of the mind meld.

[Telperiën Ar-Pharazon]

Telperiën watched as the last explosion tore a ship asunder. She watched as distant bodies thrashed in the cold vacuum of space and slowly stilled, frozen and decompressed.A prick of fear caught in her heart as she watched a body float by the viewport. They were in a giant metal can with only an inch of materiel between her and such a fate. She shivered, and brought her knees up to her chest and locked them there by hugging them. She didn’t look away from the sight of carnage though and slowly expanded her presence in the force, like mama had taught her.

 

Fear, terror, panic, and pure gluttonous hunger rocked the force with its purity. She could feel her adopted father’s fear for her life, her mother's cool apathy, and Sheog’s hunger. Slowly, she siphoned through it, to listen for what the force had in store for her in this battle, until she felt it. A call, dark in its measure, beckoning her to the surface from the Dark Lord. She looked up to her companion, Raia, and smiled drearily as the ship came to rest in its berth on the Kyber. Telperiën unbuckled her crash webbing and crawled out of it and gave the older girl a long hug. Then she gave the droidy one too. For luck.

 

As they walked down the ramp together, she could see Ca’Aran leaning against his starfighter spaceship and his eyes were close as if he was resting. But the amount of sweat that soaked his hair told her that he had only just gotten out of his ship and pulled off his helmet. She waved and then ducked away to follow the call. She shot a smirk at Raia as she ran towards a troop shuttle and jumped through the landing hatch as the ship took off for the Wookiee homeworld.

[Telperiën Ar-Pharazon]

The Black Sun crew of the drop shuttle Zioness Valtoro laughed as she was finally revealed kicking and punching by one of the Sunners who had seen her climb aboard. They were big men and women, all at least two heads taller than herself and brawny. But there was one thing they did not know.

 

She hated being laughed at.

 

Good, use that, lust for it, consume it as it consumes you.

 

The voice of the old warhammer of the sith whispered in her ear. She clenched her fist as their laughter continued, her eyes darkening as one of the men grabbed his canteen of liquor and took a long gulp. His eyes turned on her and she glowered at him. Before he could make a biting comment she held up her hand, palm towards him and slowly mimicked making a fist. Her voice was hoarse as she spoke the words of a curse that she had seen only several times before. But had used on her enough to know its power and intricacy.

 

Azagrath ensfare asfelt ezgarth

 

His laughter died in his throat and his eyes bulged. His breath came out a wheeze of air, the veins on his neck and face growing dark as the space that surrounded the dropshuttle. The other passengers stood silently, realizing their fate would be similar if they continued their laughter. Their fear was palpable in the air, tasting of bitterness and sweat.

 

Azagrath ensfare asfelt ezgarth

 

She whispered the words again, pulling the force in a string that surrounded the man, leaching off his body, his muscles were eaten by their self made acids and his very blood turned to poison in his veins. Such was the power of the Nightsisters of Dathomir. Seldom seen and seldom used. Save on their own people. The same curse that had taken her brothers. Her body shook with the effort, her face dark and eyes a wicked yellow.

 

The man finally collapsed in a pool of blood that had spilled from his eyes and ears in dark crimson waterfalls. Leaving her with all eyes in the dropship on her small diminutive form. The tension in the shuttle was finally cut by the voice of the shuttle pilot who was blissfully unaware of the sudden despicable violence that a nine year old girl had just committed upon a relatively innocent man.

 

“ETA two minutes to drop, ground fire flashing towards us, buckle up gents.”

[Telperiën Ar-Pharazon]

Telperiën held onto one of the flight handles on the side of the shuttle as ground fire rocked the ship like a leaf in a stiff wind. The murder of their fellow soldier all but forgotten by the men as the ship shook and whined as it dove through superheated atmosphere. It was not long at all until they had made a very rough groundfall.

 

The ship ground itself to a stop in the thick sand of a Kashyyykian beach and the troops boiled out with war cries flying like arrows from their throats. It was a beautiful thing to watch as one by one they were gunned down by a weapon emplacement somewhere up in the trees. Red and green blaster bolt tore through human and alien flesh like a brilliant fireworks display. In the underbrush she saw a ronto tearing wildly through the trees, panicked and all out of its element. When the ship was all but empty of soldiers, Telperiën sprinted in serpentine, dodging left to right, her bare feet making little impression on the white sand and carrying her as fast as she could muster to a low hedge of vegetation. Danger sense pricked up and she dove into the bushes, narrowly avoiding a bolt from a wookiee powered crossbow. The red fire hot bolt curved around her back and left a furrow of smoking tunic and seared flesh. Telperiën kept the scream of pain internal and she burrowed into the underbrush, she couldn’t very well take on an entire force of dug in wookiees.The brutes.

She crawled slowly in the underbrush, pulling herself forward with her arms, silent as she had been on hunting parties back on Dathomir. Except this prey wasn’t rabbits, it was very strong and very pissed off beasts. Meter by meter she pulled herself forward, the brown dirt streaking itself across her tunic and armour, concealing the blacks and reds of her armour in a dirty but camouflaged brown and black. Soon after minutes of crawling she was underneath the gun emplacement. She stretched out with her senses as her mother had taught her and felt three of them.

 

Or perhaps a nest of them, with their big guns right above her, twenty or so arm lengths in a tree platform. Telperiën lay quietly in the bushes at the tree roots, and kept quiet until she was sure that no one was looking for her or had sensed her, then she slowly pulled out the force strengthened wooden knife that her mother had given her and clenched the blade between her teeth to keep it handy for the climb. The wood tasted bitter and damp in her mouth, slightly like blood, probably from one of the many kills her mother Qaela had gotten with it.

 

Looking up and down the tree she finally found a route in its thick, scaled bark and followed it. She had been taught on Dathomir how to freeclimb efficiently, placing her hands in the many cracks that scattered the bark of the mighty tree and slowly scaled the trunk. One handhold at a time. Until she was at the edge of the platform. She pulled herself up to her elbows and rested her chin on the edge, looking at her targets. Her purple eyes scanning the platform ahead of her. Three large furry beasts, eight feet tall, and stronger than any man she had ever encountered. Their fur a mix of browns and dark blacks. All of them had their backs to her and they were distracted picking off soldiers from the armies of Black Sun and the Sith. Telperiën took a deep breath and let her mind focus onto the force, she could sense the strong presences of the Trinity and even Raia not very far away but she was not looking for them though she did take the moment to pass Raia some reassurance.

 

You come to me again child?

 

The voice was her father’s, wicked and dark in its tones that washed through her mind.

 

Yes, I need your advice on how to deal with these creatures.

 

The laugh that echoed in return quick and biting. Censuring her weakness.

 

Reach into his mind and carve out his soul.

Release his inner beast and you will break him and them.

 

Telperiën reached out with her mind to touch the largest wookiee’s mind. He was concentrating and rejoicing in the fight, bathing in every victory, celebrating each human kill as a sacred act of revenge against the invaders. She dove through the unfamiliar mind, searching for the shield, the block that kept him from breaking, and finally found the siphon that he put every action through.

 

Nallani

 

His mate, his love, his life.

 

She grabbed that memory with the force and brutally tore it away. The reaction was immediate, the claws on the tips of his fingers emerged and he began churning through rounds, blasting everything that moved with the E-Web he commanded. One of his partners put her hand on his back to steady him and he reacted with a slash of his claws. Then the fight was on. The E-web silenced as the bloody brawl began between former friends and ended with both smaller wookiee’s laying at the bottom of the platform, broken and bloody.

 

Telperiën pulled herself to her feet and let out a laugh of victory that instantly died in her throat as the beast she created turned on her. Fear spiked like bile into her throat as she pulled the knife from her clenched teeth and held it in one shaking hand.

 

Kriff

[Telperiën Ar-Pharazon]

She tried to dodge aside from the wookiee’s wrath but was caught in its storm. She had only two options, dive off the platform or stand and fight.

 

She was Telperiën Ar-Pharazon, the daughter of Qaela and Lord Ar-Pharazon the Golden and she would not bow to any beast of the wild. Instead she swallowed her fear and struck when the moment was right.

 

Though razor sharp and durasteel strong, the knife that Qaela Darksong had bequeathed upon her daughter did little stop the raging madclaw. Her first strike was true, driving deep into his abdomen up to the hilts, the soft underfur tickling at her wrist and the deep crimson of his lifeblood spewed forth like a gurgling brook to splash and babble down her arms. Though the blow was fatal, it was not immediately so, which bode a doomful tide for the young daughter of once great Sith Lords. Panic struck her heart when the long arm of the Wookiee picked her up with ease by her bloody wrist and his other long appendage grabbed at her throat. She fell into the force, letting the panic and pain feed her. She began to chant as her eyes turned a bright yellow.

 

“Azagrath ens-”

 

Wookiee claws were sharper than she realized, tearing through her neck with little effort. Time seemed to slow as she could feel the sharp knife like claws cut through first her skin and then to the veins and arteries, voice box, and trachea below it. Cutting off the words of her chant and leaving her life hanging in the balance. She tried to speak but only felt a bubble of blood and air bleed out the gash in her neck, to pop uselessly under her chin. A gush of bile and blood followed it, spilling across her black armoured chest. Her eyes blinked several times as a red void began to enter her vision from the sides.

 

The wookiee, believing her dead, tossed her from the platform to land twenty meters below in the white sand of the beach.

[Telperiën Ar-Pharazon]

 The blood of a thousand generations of power flowed in the coursing veins of a walking corpse. The blood of great Ar-Pharazon and Nightsong mixed and mingled with every failing replication. Had the curse in the blood gotten worse since the Spider had withdrawn from the universe? Since his empire had fallen in a string of failed assaults. For the empire had fallen a long time ago, for an empire built around the character cult of a single man could not long survive his departure. 

 

Where were the legions? Where were the flocks of Sith Lords that had hounded the corridors of Onderon while victory was still so sweet? 

 

Like the ghosts they had faded at the first sight of defeat. Leaving their betters to hold the tattered banners as the fleets retreated from Corellia. And now those brave Sith that had remained were seeing the rise of the galaxy against them. A few systems had become a thousand, and the few sabers of the Jedi had become a storm of light. 

 

Yet here she was, one of the steadfast allies of the Spider, now running from the destiny she herself had invited. 

 

A destiny of ruin. A destiny of doom. A destiny of blood. A destiny foretold. 

 

In the deepness of her mind the prophetic words of a dying Jedi master thundered. Screamed as fire flickered under his pyre, through lips black and bloody. But she could not remember the words, even as she searched her memories of that long ago mission. A mission of knives and blades. Blood and a dead wolf. 

 

She let out a long sigh, for she could not remember. A flash of anger spilled like the tears that were dripping from the corners of her eyes. Tears of hopes broken asunder by her own choices. 

[Telperiën Ar-Pharazon]

But what was this light? This pure heart that beat so steadily in the face of total darkness? That calming rhythm that flickered at the edges of her consciousness? Her heartbeat was almost musical, every contraction of the aorta pushing blood through living tissues. Was it the heartbeat that brought her to this dismal world? A pretty face? Perhaps a promised end to a curse that had hounded her from death to death. The Heir of Ar-Pharazon did not know. Perhaps it was all of those things. 

 

She slowly stood as the shuttle settled into one of the burned out landing pads nestled in the husk of a great tree. The two sabre cats that had so faithfully served this bodies’ owner crowded around her feet, looking up with eager and fearful eyes. For they did not like this change, where one there had been laughter, only a brooding silence remained. It unsettled them. Her face was still there, but the light behind her eyes had changed. 

 

“Hono, Kai.” She whispered, reaching down to scratch behind the ears of the foremost cat. “All will be alright.” 

 

They did not believe her, but followed anyway. That was their duty.  And perhaps if she found what she wanted on this strange grassless land, her smile would return. 

[Telperiën Ar-Pharazon]

The two saber cats bared their stark white fangs, stepping in front of their mistress in a defensive crouch, the fur behind their ears furrowing and standing tall in some primordial gesture of menace. Nothing much to scar an Acklay and a full Jedi knight, but they were ready for the fight if it offered itself. Telperien waved her hand at the two felines and they calmed instantly, sitting and wrapping their spiked tails around their front paws, their stark yellow-grey eyes watching their mistress with fascination. 

 

“They belonged to this former body, they serve their purpose.” 

 

She ran her long finders through the fur at the base of Kai’s skull, causing him to pur, and the long pointed ears to twitch in pleasure. Telperien smiled softly and looked back up to Kadi. It was good to see her again, she was a beautiful specimen of a modern Iridonian Zabrak, horns that curved wonderfully up from the light tattooing around her forehead. It was an intriguing feeling to look at someone like her, a sworn enemy, and feel only the loneliness in her own heart. 

 

Not hate. Even the strange desire she had felt in their last combat did not stir itself in the pit of her belly. Only a stark and bleak loneliness. Telperien held out a hand towards the two saber cats, holding a scrap of meat that she had packed from their last stop. 

 

“It is good to see you... I trust you are well?”

[Telperiën Ar-Pharazon]

Telperien likewise sat, pulling her knees up to her chest and resting her chin on top of them. She lifted a hand and pointed to the creatures in turn. Her thin finger pointed to one of the saber cats, who bore a thin white stripe from the muzzle to the tip of its long tail. Then to the one with a matching black stripe. 

 

“This is Hono, and Kai.” 

 

She waved the finger again and released the two cats from the subtle control she kept on them. They reacted instantly to the Jedi’s use of the force. Bounding up to the woman to give her gentle but persistent head butts until she petted them. They were animals originally bred for war in the ancient pre human era of Naboo. But they also deeply desired the loving contact of others. They were a little too human in that way. 

 

“I followed the force, hoping that it would lead me back to you.” 

 

The Jedi woman was an enigma, it was undoubted that Telperien was attracted to her, but she also found herself just desiring someone like Kadi to talk to. To ponder the meaning of this brutal and short life. 

[Telperiën Ar-Pharazon]

Telperien lay back and likewise let her eyes follow the twisting and burnt branches, tracing them in their vain attempt to reach the most sunlight possible. Unconscious to the fact that their greed could smother the undergrowth a hundred meters below them. Was it natural that the young grass that tickled the back of her neck could only survive when the wroshyr trees above them were burned and carbonized by turbolaser fire? Was it natural when the Katarn hunters killed and ate a Kinrath? Were the short and brutal lives of predator and prey something that a Jedi Naturalist considered a good thing? A source for their power? 

 

So many questions, but the young grass felt good against the nape of her neck, and she let her mind wander. 

 

“We do not need to talk at all. I am no philosopher and no great debater.”

 

The ears of the two sabercats perked up, and a low growl whispered deep in their throats. 

 

“Ah but it looks like we may have a hunt on our hands, Jedi. Will you come with us?” 

 

Telperien scrambled to her feet and held out a hand to the Jedi knight as the two cats looked at their master. Longing. She nodded and the two cats exploded into action. Bounding in great leaps after whatever prey they had caught the scent of. A very scared Minstyngar who was runnign as fast as its paws could carry it. The Hunt was on. 

[Telperiën Ar-Pharazon]

With a wave of her hand the Nightsister pulled the naturally made shadows around her, deadening her form as she deadened the sound of her footfalls. Her bare feet making no noise as she sprinted after the Jedi Knight. She did not draw on the force to speed herself however, that would cheapen the hunt, the thrill that came from the long run and a sharp point of a spear. 

 

She could feel the thrill of it pulsing with her heartbeat. It was adrenaline in its purest form. A nightsister becoming the predator she had always believed herself to be. She ranged behind the Minstyngar as her sabrecats kept at its heels. Snapping with each attempt to bring the beast down. But the cats had long avoided their predatory nature, living in the slums of Naboo, eating what their master fed them. So, a push was needed. 

 

Her mind connected with them, and she urged them onwards, stirring their beastial emotions. Their desire to maim and kill. To eat and devour. And the sabercats obeyed, a froth forming at their lips as they prepared for the fatal strike…

[Telperiën Ar-Pharazon]

The nightsister ran easily through the underbrush, her bare feet making little sound as she sprinted after the two sabercats and the Zabrak Jedi Knight. The flow of the force was so easy to tap into on the wookiee homeworld. The dark overhanging trees reminded her of Dathomir before it had been laid to ruin. And though it was slightly different, the undercurrent in the force of primal predators searching for their prey was delicious to tap into. No wonder the great furry humanoids loved their homeworld so, she could get lost in the darkness here. Revel in it, bathe and drink of it until it covered her from head to toe in its shadows. 

 

The swift and generous power offered by the nature of Kashyyyk enthralled her. So much so she nearly missed the directions Kadi yelled at her, so Telperien was forced to jump after her. Running up the side of a burned out wyshor tree, landing at the heels of the Zabrak jedi, and letting that energy flow through her and into her two sabercats. 

 

Driving their hunting instincts and hers into a frenzy. 

[Telperiën Ar-Pharazon]

The nightsister’s gaze searched the heavy brush as she ran, her eyes seaking the fleeting form of the Jedi Knight. Telperien’s mind was racing as she sprinted through the close clinging mires, letting the force guide every step. Her speed fueled by a mix of sudden rage and delight. But why the sudden peak of imperius rage? Was it the burned remains of a civilization that they ran through? Was it the realization that everything her mother and father had striven for now lay in ruins? 

 

Was it rage at the Jedi knight for trying to teach her a lesson that she herself knew nothing about? Yes, that was the source of the sudden fire that pushed her steps. How did the jedi expect someone like her to control herself? How could she control herself if she had never once been told or shown how? What a privileged life Kadi must have lived. Did she not know that the only joy that had ever stirred the soul of the nightsister had been in the thrill of a hunt? 

 

There was a purpose. The hunt itself, the pleasure from it, the fellign of an innocent prey, the feral desire of the blood spilling upon the ground. Telperien could almost taste the fear in the air and it made her mouth water spectacularly. Oh to taste that blood! 

[Telperiën Ar-Pharazon]

Red eyes narrowed as blood dripped from churning jaws. The two great cats noisily fed on their prey as their mistress wiped the blood from her narrow set chin. It was strange to be alone again, even as such a friendship had blossomed it was already gone. Or at the very least put away in the cupboard, something to be looked at, to be admired, but not used. Standing in stasis as the galaxy spun itself into darkness. 

 

She reached into the carcass and placed a blood stained hand onto the no longer beating heart. She squeezed, letting her fingernails rip into aortic tissue and bright red blood spill forth. She pulled the quivering heart from the beast and looked into the cavities her fingers had left. Reading the twitching tissue like a R2 unit would read a starmap. But this was no good omen. And it read of despair and loathing, a churning galaxy and the death of heroes and villains. Of Friends and Enemies. 

 

She grimaced at the sign and let the heart fall away.

[Telperiën Ar-Pharazon]

She was deep in the forest now, letting the hunting instinct guide her as it had guided her people for generations. Slowly, the scent had begun to develop. Starting first as a brush of the force against her own presence. What strange and haunting specters played across her mind. A glimpse of strange innocence, a clearing and a campfire, fresh rations being added to boiling water. Laughing and joy. A ship being unloaded with camping and survival supplies. A final joy after being so long on the move. A delicious chance at an innocent prey. And a prey with certain material possessions that would work in Telperiën’s advantage. 

 

For a brief moment she thought of her Iridonian friend, and what she might have thought at such a pursuit. But the very thought made a prickle of anger crawl up her spine. A wave of spite and anger that gave her limbs a sudden lightness and doubled her speed as she followed the scent. Outpacing her two feline companions as she slipped the leather satchel off of her shoulder. 

 

The muddy ground made little sound as she ran through the deep woods, pausing to crouch at the edge of the natural clearing made by a decade old turbolaser blast. She took another breath, letting the scent filter across her tongue. Foreign smells. A faint perfume lingering with boiled noodles. Colonists perhaps? A look around the base of a giant wroshyr tree showed their sleek Nubian designed shuttle which reflected the shallow greens of the recovering forest from its mirror-like hull. 

 

Six human adults. Refugees from their various states of dress. Two teenagers and one child. They sat around their duraplast camp table, feasting on meager rations with not a care for the world around them. Whatever world or collections of worlds they had come from had not prepared them for what could be lurking in the growing shadows. There was a feast here for the taking, an easy meal for creatures so inclined. She let the idea in the force linger in the air as she sought an easy outlet for her anger and rage. Her two sabrecats beckoned to her call, their mouths growing frothy with anticipation. But something else on the edge of the forest also answered. Something ancient and whose soul had long ago been fully consumed by the needs of bloody predation. 

 

From her satchel she withdrew the long wooden staff of a longbow, placing one horn plated end against the bulk of a tree root and using the leverage to bend it far enough to string. Slipping the hempen cord over the rancor bone notch, before stooping to pull a wicked black feathered arrow from the bag. A broadhead of darksteel. Forged from the wreckage of the Galactic Alliance cruiser Tiberious, which had fallen to earth during the battle of Onderon. Tempered by Krath metallurgists into weapons for the servants of the Dark Lord himself. Imbued with the same hatred and malice that had forged the Sith Empire not a half a decade past.

 

All in ruins now. And the very thought of such a failure made bile churn in her stomach. She took a calming breath and notched the wicked arrow, thinking for a moment of all those friends and masters that had died on their crusade for power. Those great Sith had failed, had died and were banished into eternal darkness, while these weak beings had survived to find a new life. What better prey to hunt than those that deserved it? 

 

The black feathered arrow flew free, embedding itself in the skull of one of the men in the clearing, right as he reached to take from the communal dish. Spilling bright red blood in a gush that covered half the table. How freeing the sight was as she surrendered herself to the bitter hunt. Her two sabercats rushing forth from their hiding places. Their cackling screams joining Telperiën’s own. But above it all, even the din of sudden battle and pumping blood, came the dark roar of an ancient malice. 

 

[Telperiën Ar-Pharazon]

The large muscle groups on her back bunched painfully as she drew the longbow again, pulling the heavy black ash shaft up alongside her cheek and feeling the whisper of the feathers beside her ear. Aiming was more in the instinct built by long practice since childhood. And when she loosed the hemp cord, the ash shaft slapped into the throat of another refugee, carrying the two razor sharp blades of the broadhead up and through his neck and burying itself in the sidewall of the Nubian starship behind him. He pitched lazily forwards, his spinal column severed and bright red blood gushing into the fertile ground. 

 

She could almost taste the copper bite of the blood as it fountained into the grass. Telperien savored the hopeless fear in the blood as the ground of Kashyyyk greedily drank from her victim. Alas for that, but there would be more, and not all would be wasted upon the soil. 

 

The cord beneath her fingers sang again and another arrow cut the life from a refugee as the twin sabercats tore his wife in half mere feet from him. Perhaps their eyes met and whispered a message of love. But likely not, as their screams of agony gave little love at all beyond sobs of mercy. 

 

The remaining refugees tried to flee of course, but the mighty beast made himself known with a roar that shook the clearing and with a swipe of a claw crushed the last adult of the group into the loamy soil of kashyyyk. Now there were only the younger humans to hunt. And their fear tasted delicious on the wind.