Path of Destruction

by Drew Karpyshyn

  The assembled generals and strategists of the Brotherhood of Darkness nodded in agreement. Several raised their voices in roars of triumph and congratulations. Only Kopecz refused to join in the celebrations.

  “The Army of Light still outnumbers us two to one,” the heavyset Twi’lek reminded them. “Their lines may be overextended in some places, but we don’t know where they are vulnerable. They know our scouts are watching; they hide their numbers just as we hide ours. If we attack a location where their numbers are strong, we’ll be slaughtered!”

  The rest of the generals stilled their voices, no longer swept up in their leader’s enthusiasm now that the glaring flaw in his plan had been exposed. Again, there were rumbles of disagreement and displeasure. Kopecz ignored the reaction of the other Dark Lords. For all their power, for all their ambition, they were like so many banthas, blindly following the rest of the herd. In theory everyone in the Brotherhood of Darkness was equal, but in practice Kaan ruled the others.

  Kopecz understood this, and he was willing to follow him. The Sith needed a strong and charismatic leader, a man of vision, to quell the infighting that had plagued their ranks. Kaan was just such a leader, and he was normally a brilliant military tactician. But this plan was madness. Suicide. Unlike the rest of the rabble, Kopecz wasn’t about to follow their leader into certain death.

  “You underestimate me, Kopcez,” Kaan reassured him, his voice calm and confident, as if he had anticipated this question all along and had an answer prepared. Perhaps he did. “We won’t strike until we know exactly where they are most vulnerable,” the Dark Lord explained. “By the time we attack, we’ll know the precise number and composition of every unit and patrol along their perimeter.”

  “How?” Kopecz demanded. “Even our Umbaran shadow spies can’t provide us with that kind of detail. Not quickly enough to use it in planning our attack. We have no way of getting the information we’d need.”

  Kaan laughed. “Of course we do. One of the Jedi will give it to us.”

  The flaps covering the entrance of the long tent serving as the Sith war room parted as if on cue, and a young human woman clad in the robes of the Jedi order stepped through. She was of average height, but that was the only thing about her that could ever be called average. She had thick, raven hair that tumbled down past her shoulders. Her face and figure were perfect examples of the human female form; her tricopper-hued skin was set off by green eyes smoldering with a heat that was both a warning and an invitation. She moved with the lithe grace of a Twi’lek dancer as she walked the length of the assembled Dark Lords, a coy smile on her lips as she pretended not to hear their whispers of surprise.

  Kopecz had seen many striking females in his time. Several of the female Dark Lords gathered in the tent were gorgeous, renowned as much for their incredible beauty as their devastating power. But as the young Jedi drew closer, he found he was unable to take his eyes off her. There was something magnetic about her, something that transcended mere physical attractiveness.

  She carried her head high, her proud features issuing an unspoken challenge as she approached. And Kopecz saw something else: naked ambition, raw and hungry.

  At his side Kaan whispered, “Remarkable, isn’t she?”

  She reached the front of the tent and dipped smoothly to one knee, bowing her head ever so slightly in deference to Lord Kaan.

  “Welcome, Githany,” he said, motioning for her to rise. “We’ve been waiting for you.”

  “It’s my pleasure, Lord Kaan,” she purred. Kopecz felt his knees go momentarily weak at her sensual voice, then snapped to rigid attention. He was too old and too wise to let himself be blinded by this woman’s charms. He cared only about what she could offer them against the Jedi.

  “You have information for us?” he asked abruptly.

  She tilted her head to one side and gave him a curious glance, trying to find the reason for his cold reception. After a moment’s pause she answered, “I can tell you exactly where to strike at their lines, and when. Lord Hoth put a Jedi named Kiel Charny in charge of coordinating their defenses. I got the information directly from him.”

  “Why would this Charny share that kind of information with you?” Kopecz asked suspiciously.

  She gave him a sly grin. “Kiel and I were … close. We shared many things. He had no idea I would come to you with the information.”

  Kopecz narrowed his eyes. “I thought the Jedi disapproved of that sort of thing.”

  Her smile became a sneer. “The Jedi disapprove of a lot of things. That’s why I’ve come to you.”

  Kaan stepped forward before he could ask any more questions, placing a familiar hand on her hip and turning her away from Kopecz.

  “We don’t have time for this, Githany,” he said. “You must give us your report and return to the Jedi camp before anyone notices you’re missing.”

  She flashed a dazzling smile at Kaan and nodded. “Of course. We have to hurry.”

  He gently ushered her over to the holomap, and a knot of strategists closed in, shielding her from view as she gave them the details of the Jedi guard. A few seconds later Kaan emerged from the crowd and walked back over to stand beside Kopecz.

  “Ambition, betrayal—the dark side is strong in her,” the Twi’lek whispered. “I’m surprised the Jedi ever took her in.”

  “They probably believed they could turn her to the light,” Kaan replied, speaking just as softly. “But Githany was born to the dark side. Like me. Like you. It was inevitable she would join the Sith someday.”

  “The timing is fortunate,” Kopecz noted. “Maybe a little too fortunate. It may be a trap. Are you sure we can trust her? I think she’s dangerous.”

  Kaan dismissed the warning with a soft laugh. “So are you, Lord Kopecz. That’s what makes you so useful to the Brotherhood.”

  Bane was floating, weightless, surrounded by darkness and silence. It seemed he was adrift in the black void of death itself.

  Then consciousness began to return. His body, jerked from blissful unawareness, thrashed in the dark green fluid of the bacta tank, creating a stream of bubbles that rose silently to the surface. His heart began to pound; he could hear the blood rushing through his veins.

  His eyes popped open in time to see a med droid come over to adjust some of the settings on his tank. Within seconds his heart rate slowed and the involuntary thrashing of his bruised and broken limbs settled. But though his body was calmed by the tranquilizer, Bane’s mind was now fully alert and aware.

  Memories of motion and pain flickered across his mind. The sights, sounds, and smells of combat. He remembered the approach of bloodstained boots: his blood. Kas’im must have stepped in after he’d blacked out and kept Sirak from killing him. They must have brought him here to heal.

  At first he was surprised that they would bother to help him recover. Then he realized that he, like all the students at the Academy, was too valuable to the Brotherhood to simply throw away. So he would survive … but his life was essentially over.

  Since coming to the Academy he had worked toward one clear goal. All his studying, all his training had been for one single purpose: to understand and command the power of the dark side of the Force. The dark side would bring him power. Glory. Strength. Freedom.

  Now he would be a pariah at the Academy. He would be allowed to listen in on the group lessons, to practice his skills in Kas’im’s training sessions, but that would be all. Any hope he might have had of getting one-on-one training with any of the Masters had been crushed in his humiliating defeat. And without that specializing guidance, his potential would wither and die.

  In theory all in the Brotherhood were equal, but Bane was smart enough to see the real truth. In practice the Sith needed leaders, Masters like Kaan, or Lord Qordis here at the Academy. The strong always stepped forward; the weak had no choice but to follow.

  Now Bane was doomed to be one of the followers. A life of subservience and obedience.

  Through victory
my chains are broken. But Bane had not found victory, and he understood all too well the chains of servitude that would bind him forevermore. He was destroyed.

  Part of him wished Sirak had just finished the job.

  14

  There was an air of unusual celebration in the halls of the Sith Academy. The Brotherhood of Darkness had scored a resounding victory over the Jedi on Ruusan, and the jubilation of the feast Qordis had thrown to mark the victory lingered in the air. During training sessions, drills, and lessons, students could be heard whispering excitedly as details of the battle were shared. The Jedi on Ruusan had been completely wiped out, some said. Others insisted Lord Hoth himself had fallen. There were rumors that the Jedi Temple on Coruscant was defenseless, and it was only a matter of days before it was ransacked by the Dark Lords of the Sith.

  The Masters knew that much of what was being said was exaggerated or inaccurate. The Jedi on Ruusan had been routed, but a great many had managed to escape the battle. Lord Hoth was not dead; most likely he was rallying the Jedi for the inevitable counterattack. And the Jedi Temple on Coruscant was still well beyond the reach of Kaan and the Brotherhood of Darkness. On the orders of Qordis, however, the instructors allowed the enthusiasm of their apprentices to go unchecked for the sake of improving morale.

  The exultant mood at the Academy had little effect on Bane, however. It had taken three weeks of regular sessions in the bacta tank before he’d fully recovered from the horrific beating Sirak had given him. Most of the time a loss in the dueling ring required only a day or two in the tanks before the student was ready to resume training. Of course, most of the students didn’t lose as badly as Bane had.

  Hurst had been free with his fists, and Bane had suffered more than a few severe thrashings growing up. The punishments of his youth had taught him how to deal with physical pain, but the trauma inflicted by Sirak was far worse than anything he’d endured at his father’s hands.

  Bane shuffled slowly down the halls of the Academy, though his measured pace was one of choice rather than necessity. The lingering discomfort he felt was insignificant. Thanks to the bacta tanks his broken bones had mended and his bruises had vanished completely. The emotional damage, however, was more difficult to reverse.

  A pair of laughing apprentices approached, regaling each other with supposedly factual accounts of the Sith victory on Ruusan. Their conversation stopped as they neared the solitary figure. Bane ducked his head to avoid meeting their eyes as they passed. One whispered something unintelligible, but the contempt in her tone was unmistakable.

  Bane didn’t react. He was dealing with the emotional pain in the only way he knew how. The same way he’d dealt with it as a child. He withdrew into himself, tried to make himself invisible to avoid the scorn and derision of others.

  His defeat—so public and so complete—had destroyed his already suspect reputation with both the students and the Masters. Even before the duel many had sensed that his power had left him. Now their suspicions had been confirmed. Bane had become an outcast at the Academy, shunned by the other students and disregarded by the Masters.

  Even Sirak ignored him. He had beaten his rival into submission; Bane was no longer worthy of his notice. The Zabrak’s attention, like the attention of nearly all the apprentices, had turned to the young human female who had come to join them shortly after the battle on Ruusan.

  Her name was Githany. Bane had heard that she had once been a Jedi Padawan but had rejected the light in favor of the dark side … a common enough story at the Academy. Githany, however, was anything but common. She had played an integral role in the Sith victory on Ruusan, and had arrived at Korriban with the fanfare of a conquering hero.

  Bane hadn’t been strong enough to attend the victory feast where Qordis had introduced the new arrival to the rest of the students, but he had seen her several times at the Academy since then. She was stunningly beautiful; it was obvious that many of the male students lusted after her. It was just as obvious that several of the female students were jealous of her, though they kept their resentment well hidden for their own sake.

  Githany was as arrogant and cruel as she was physically becoming, and the Force was exceptionally strong in her. In only a few weeks she’d already developed a reputation for crushing those who got in her way. It was no surprise she had quickly became a favorite of Qordis and the other Dark Lords.

  None of this really mattered to Bane, however. He trudged on through the halls, head down, making his way to the library located in the depths of the Academy. Studying the archives had seemed the best way to supplement the teachings of the Masters in the early stages of his development. Now the cold, quiet room far beneath the Temple’s main floors offered him his only place of refuge.

  Not surprisingly, the massive room was empty save for the rows of shelves stacked with manuscripts haphazardly arranged and then forgotten. Few students bothered to come here. Why waste time contemplating the wisdom of the ancients when you could study at the feet of an actual Dark Lord? Even Bane came here only as a last resort; the Masters wouldn’t waste their time on him anymore.

  But as he perused the ancient texts, a part of him he’d thought dead began to reawaken. The inner fire—the burning rage that had always been his secret reserve—was gone. Still, even if only faintly, the dark side called to him, and Bane realized that he wasn’t ready to give up on himself. And so he gave himself up to studying.

  It wasn’t permissible for students to remove records from the archive room, so Bane did all his reading there. Yesterday he had finally completed a rather long and detailed treatise by an ancient Sith Lord named Naga Sadow on the uses of alchemy and poisons. Even in that he had found small kernels of deeper wisdom he had claimed for his own. Bit by bit his knowledge was growing.

  He walked slowly up and down the rows, glancing at titles and authors, hoping to find something useful. He was so intent on his search that he failed to notice the dark, hooded figure that entered the archives and stood silently in the doorway, watching him.

  Githany didn’t say a word as the tall, broad-shouldered man wandered through the archives. He was physically imposing; even under his loose-fitting robes his muscles were obvious. Concentrating as she had been taught by the Jedi Masters before she’d betrayed them, she was able to feel the power of the dark side in him; he was remarkably strong in the Force. Yet he didn’t carry himself like a man who was strong or powerful. Even here, away from the eyes of anyone else, he walked stooped over, his shoulders hunched.

  This was what Sirak could do to a rival, she realized. This was what he could do to her if she went up against him and lost. Githany had every intention of challenging the Academy’s acknowledged top student … but only once she was certain she could beat him in the dueling ring.

  She had sought out Bane hoping to learn from his mistakes. Seeing him now, weak and broken, she realized she might be able to get more from him than just information. Normally she would be wary of allying herself with another student, particularly one as strong as Bane. Githany preferred to work alone; she knew all too well how devastating the consequences of unexpected betrayal could be.

  But the man she saw was vulnerable, exposed. He was alone and desperate; he was in no position to betray anyone. She could control him, using him as necessary and disposing of him when she was done.

  He took a book down from one of the shelves and walked slowly over to the tables. She waited until he had settled himself in and begun his reading. She took a deep breath and cast back her hood, letting her long tresses cascade down her shoulders. Then she put on her most seductive smile and moved in.

  Bane carefully opened the pages of the ancient volume he had taken down from the archive shelves. It was titled The Rakata and the Unknown World, and according to the date was nearly three thousand standard years old. But it wasn’t the title or subject matter that had grabbed him. It was the author: Darth Revan. Revan’s story was well known to Sith and Jedi alike. What intrigued Bane was the
use of the Darth title.

  None of the modern Sith used the Darth name, preferring the designation Dark Lord. Bane had always found this puzzling, but he had never asked the Masters about it. Perhaps in this volume by one of the last great Sith to use the designation he could find out why the tradition had fallen into disuse.

  He had barely begun to read the first page when he heard someone approaching. He glanced up to see the Academy’s newest apprentice—Githany—striding toward him. She was smiling, making her already remarkable features even more attractive. In the past Bane had only seen her from a distance; up close she literally took his breath away. As she swept into the seat beside him, the faintest whiff of perfume tickled his nose, causing his already racing heart to quicken its beat.

  “Bane,” she whispered, speaking softly even though there was no one else in the archives to be disturbed by their conversation. “I’ve been looking for you.”

  Her statement caught him by surprise. “Looking for me? Why?”

  She placed a hand on his forearm. “I need you. I need your help against Sirak.”

  Her closeness, the brief contact with his arm, and her alluring fragrance sent his head spinning. It took him several moments to figure out what she meant, but once he did her sudden interest in him became obvious. News of his humiliation at the Zabrak’s hands had reached her ears. She had come to see him in person, hoping she might learn something that would keep her from falling victim to a similar failure.

  “I can’t help you with Sirak,” he said, turning away from her and burying his face in his book.

  The hand on his forearm gently squeezed, and he looked up again. She had leaned in closer, and he found himself staring right into her emerald eyes.

  “Please, Bane. Just listen to what I have to say.”

  He nodded, not sure if he’d even be able to speak while she was pressed so close against him. He closed the book and turned slightly in his chair to better face her. Githany gave a grateful sigh and leaned back slightly. He felt a small flicker of disappointment as her hand slipped from his arm.