Path of Destruction

by Drew Karpyshyn

  On the surface many kilometers away, Farfalla and the other Jedi felt the ground shake, and they knew their general was no more. A moment later their minds erupted with the tortured screams of the Jedi and Sith caught up in the blast, their life-force ripped away and sucked into the vacuum at the heart of the blast.

  Many of the Jedi wept in anguish, understanding how great the sacrifice of their fallen comrades had been. The spirits of the dead were bound for all eternity, forever frozen in stasis.

  Master Valenthyne Farfalla, now the leader of what remained of the Army of Light, felt the sorrow as deeply as any of them. But this was not the time for grief. With General Hoth’s passing, the burden of command was his to bear, and there were things that still needed to be done.

  “Captain Haduran, assemble a team,” he ordered. “We’re going to search the area in and around the tunnels for survivors.” He knew no living creature could have withstood the power of the thought bomb, but it was possible a few of the Sith might have fled before the detonation. After all that had been sacrificed, he had no intention of letting any of the Brotherhood escape.

  The captain gave him a quick salute and turned to go. Just before he left Farfalla added, “And have your troops keep an eye out for the bouncers. The last Sith ritual drove them to madness. Who knows what this one did to them.”

  “And if we spot them, sir?”

  “Shoot to kill.”

  * * *

  Many kilometers in the opposite direction, Darth Bane also felt the reverberations of the blast. He sensed the wave of dark side energy pass over him, strong enough to leave him shivering even at this distance. Once it was gone he reached out with the Force to seek out any who might have escaped. As he expected, he felt nothing. They were all gone: Kaan, Kopecz, Githany … all of them.

  The Brotherhood of Darkness had been purged. As far as the Jedi knew, the Sith were now extinct. Bane intended to keep it that way.

  He was the only Dark Lord of the Sith, the last of his kind. The burden of rebuilding the order would fall to him. But this time he would do it right. Instead of many there would be only two: one Master and one apprentice. One to embody the power, and one to crave it.

  To survive, the Sith had to vanish, becoming creatures of myth, legend, and nightmares. Hidden from the eyes of the Jedi, they could seek out the lost secrets of the dark side until its full power was theirs to command. Only then—once victory over their enemies was certain—would they tear aside the veil of shadows and reveal themselves.

  The path ahead would be long and difficult. It might take years or decades before they could strike at the light once more. Perhaps even centuries. But Bane was patient; he understood what was to come and what must be done. Though he himself might not live to see the triumph of the dark side, those who followed him would carry on his legacy. Someday in the distant future, the Republic would fall and the Jedi would perish, and the entire galaxy would bow down to a Dark Lord of the Sith. It was inevitable; it was the way of the dark side.

  Satisfied that his work on Ruusan was done, he began the long hike to where he had hidden his ship. He knew the remaining Jedi would come looking for survivors, but by the time they arrived he would be long gone.

  Still, one thing troubled him. In order for all this to come to pass he had to find a suitable apprentice. One strong in the Force, but not yet tainted by the teachings of the Jedi. Somewhere he needed to find a child worthy of becoming heir to all the power of the dark side.

  EPILOGUE

  Rain stirred in her sleep, yet didn’t wake. Someone was calling to her, but she didn’t want to answer. In her dreams she could imagine she was still back home with her cousins, enjoying a simple but happy life. If she woke, she knew she’d have to face the truth: that life was gone forever.

  Wake, Rain …

  It had vanished the moment that the Jedi—Master Torr, his name had been—had recruited them to join the Army of Light. She hadn’t even really wanted to join. But Bug and Tomcat, her cousins, were both going. They were her only family, and she didn’t want to be left behind. She was young—only ten—but she was strong in the Force. And so Master Torr had let her come, too.

  He had told them he was taking them to Ruusan, where they would become Jedi. Only that never happened. Their shuttle had been attacked as soon as they entered the atmosphere. What occurred next was just a blur, but she remembered an explosion and screams. One wing of the ship had sheared away and suddenly she was falling. The smoking wreckage of the shuttle became a speck in the sky above her as it spiraled off out of control and she fell down, down, down until—

  Rain, wake!

  Laa! Laa had saved her, and it was Laa who was calling to her now. Slowly she opened her eyes and sat up, still groggy.

  Rain slept long. Now Rain must wake.

  “I’m up, Laa,” she said to the bouncer hovering above her. Laa had saved her from that fall, catching her as she plummeted from hundreds of meters above Ruusan’s surface.

  Bad dreams, Rain.

  “No,” she replied. “Not bad dreams, Laa. I dreamed I was back home.” Laa never actually spoke to her; she only heard the words inside her head. They communicated through the power of the Force, Laa had once explained to her. But whenever Rain answered, she always voiced the words aloud.

  Bad dreams coming.

  Rain frowned, trying to figure out exactly what Laa was trying to tell her. Sometimes when the bouncers talked about dreams they actually meant something else. Sometimes it was as if the bouncers had visions of the future. She remembered what Laa had said just before the entire forest had exploded in flames: Bad dreams, Rain. Death dreams.

  The fires had killed most of the other bouncers. The survivors had all gone mad. All except Laa. Somehow Rain had saved her. She’d used the Force, shielding them both from the burning death and destruction, though she wasn’t quite sure how she’d done it. It had just sort of … happened. Now she and Laa had nobody left but each other.

  Bad dreams coming, the bouncer repeated.

  A few hours earlier she had felt something strange: the ground rumbling beneath her feet as if something had exploded far, far away. Was this what Laa was talking about? Was this the bad dream? Or was her friend trying to warn her about something that hadn’t happened yet?

  “I don’t understand,” she said, looking around at the bushes surrounding the clearing where she had lain down to sleep. She didn’t see anything out of the ordinary. Not yet, anyway.

  Good-bye, Rain.

  There was an aching sorrow in Laa’s words that stabbed through Rain’s heart like a knife, but she still didn’t know what the bouncer was talking about.

  Before she could ask, there was a sound from the bushes. She spun around to see two men come crashing into the clearing. She could tell right away they were Jedi: they wore the same brown robes as Master Torr, and she saw lightsabers dangling from their belts. Each one also carried a large blaster rifle.

  “Bouncer!” one shouted. “Look out!”

  They reacted so quickly their motions were nothing but a blur as they opened fire. By the time the scream left Rain’s lips, her friend was already dead.

  She was still screaming when the first Jedi ran up to her. “Are you okay, little one?” he asked, reaching down.

  Instinctively, she lashed out at him. She didn’t know how she did it; it wasn’t even a conscious thought. She only knew he had shot her friend. He had killed Laa!

  “What’s the mat—” His voice was cut short as she snapped his neck with the Force. The eyes of his companion went wide in horror, but before he could do anything else she had broken his neck, too.

  Only then did Rain stop screaming. Instead she began to cry, great heaving sobs that racked her body as she crawled over to press herself against the soft green fur of Laa’s still-warm body where it had fallen to the ground.

  Bane found her there: a young human child weeping over the remains of one of Ruusan’s native bouncers. The corpses of two young Je
di lay nearby, their heads twisted at obscene angles to their bodies. It took him only an instant to piece together what must have happened.

  The girl looked up at him as he approached, her eyes puffy and red. He guessed she was nine, maybe ten at the most. He could feel the power of the Force burning in her, fueled by grief and rage and hatred. Even if he hadn’t sensed it, the broken Jedi at her feet gave mute testament to her abilities.

  He didn’t speak, but stood silently. The girl’s sobbing stopped. She sniffled and wiped her nose with the back of her hand. Then she rose to her feet and took a tentative step toward him.

  “Who are you?” he demanded, his voice deep and threatening.

  She didn’t retreat or flee, though her reply was hesitant. “My name is Rain … I mean Zannah. My cousins used to call me Rain, but they’re dead now. Zannah’s my real name.”

  Bane nodded, understanding completely. Rain: a nickname, a name of childhood and innocence. An innocence now lost.

  “Do you know who I am?” he asked.

  She nodded and took another step forward. “You’re a Sith.”

  “You’re not afraid of me?”

  “No,” she insisted with a shake of her head, though Bane knew she wasn’t being completely honest. He could feel her fear, but it was buried beneath far stronger emotions: grief, anger, hatred, and the desire for revenge.

  “I have killed many people,” Bane warned her. “Men, women … even children.”

  She shuddered but held her ground. “I’m a killer, too.”

  Bane glanced over at the Jedi corpses, then turned his focus back to the little girl standing defiantly before him. Was she the one? Had the Force led him along this route back to his ship? Had it brought him here at this exact moment simply so he could find his apprentice?

  He asked the final, most important question. “Do you know the ways of the Force? Do you understand the true nature of the dark side?”

  “No,” Rain admitted, never dropping her gaze from his own. “But you can teach me. I’m young. I will learn.”

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  DREW KARPYSHYN is the New York Times bestselling author of Star Wars: Darth Bane: Path of Destruction and its sequel, Star Wars: Darth Bane: Rule of Two. He also wrote the acclaimed Mass Effect series of novels, and is an award-winning writer/designer of video games for BioWare. After spending most of his life in Canada he finally grew tired of the long, cold winters and headed south in search of a climate more conducive to year-round golf. He now lives in Texas with his wife, Jennifer, and their cat.

  BOOKS BY DREW KARPYSHYN

  Baldur’s Gate II: Throne of Bhaal

  Temple Hill

  Mass Effect: Revelation

  Mass Effect: Ascension

  Star Wars: Darth Bane: Path of Destruction

  Star Wars: Darth Bane: Rule of Two

  Star Wars: Darth Bane: Dynasty of Evil

  STAR WARS—The Expanded Universe

  You saw the movies. You watched the cartoon series, or maybe played some of the video games. But did you know …

  In The Empire Strikes Back, Princess Leia Organa said to Han Solo, “I love you.” Han said, “I know.” But did you know that they actually got married? And had three Jedi children: the twins, Jacen and Jaina, and a younger son, Anakin?

  Luke Skywalker was trained as a Jedi by Obi-Wan Kenobi and Yoda. But did you know that, years later, he went on to revive the Jedi Order and its commitment to defending the galaxy from evil and injustice?

  Obi-Wan said to Luke, “For over a thousand generations, the Jedi Knights were the guardians of peace and justice in the Old Republic. Before the dark times. Before the Empire.” Did you know that over those millennia, legendary Jedi and infamous Sith Lords were adding their names to the annals of Republic history?

  Yoda explained that the dreaded Sith tend to come in twos: “Always two, there are. No more, no less. A Master, and an apprentice.” But did you know that the Sith didn’t always exist in pairs? That at one time in the ancient Republic there were as many Sith as Jedi, until a Sith Lord named Darth Bane was the lone survivor of a great Sith war and created the “Rule of Two”?

  All this and much, much more is brought to life in the many novels and comics of the Star Wars expanded universe. You’ve seen the movies and watched the cartoon. Now venture out into the wider worlds of Star Wars!

  Turn the page or jump to the timeline of Star Wars novels to learn more.

  1

  Peace is a lie. There is only passion.

  Through passion, I gain strength.

  Through strength, I gain power.

  Through power, I gain victory.

  Through victory, my chains are broken.

  The Code of the Sith

  Darth Bane, the only Sith Lord to escape the devastation of Kaan’s thought bomb, marched quickly under a pale yellow Ruusan sun, moving steadily across the bleak, war-torn landscape. He was two meters tall, and his black boots covered the ground in long, sweeping strides, propelling his large, powerfully muscled frame with a sense of urgent purpose. There was an air of menace about him, accentuated by his shaved head, his heavy brow, and the dark intensity of his eyes. This, even more than his forbidding black armor or the sinister hook-handled lightsaber dangling from his belt, marked him as a man of fearsome power: a true champion of the dark side of the Force.

  His thick jaw was set in grim determination against the pain that flared up every few minutes at the back of his bare skull. He had been many kilometers away from the thought bomb when it detonated, but even at that range he had felt its power reverberating through the Force. The aftereffects lingered, sporadic bursts shooting through his brain like a million tiny knives stabbing at the dark recesses of his mind. He had expected these attacks to fade over time, but in the hours since the blast, their frequency and intensity had steadily increased.

  He could have called on the Force to keep the pain at bay, cloaking himself in an aura of healing energy. But that was the way of the Jedi, and Bane was a Dark Lord of the Sith. He walked a different path, one that embraced suffering, drawing strength from the ordeal. He transformed the pain into anger and hate, feeding the flames of the dark side until his physical aspect seemed almost to glow with the fury of a storm it could barely contain.

  The terrifying image Bane projected contrasted sharply with the small figure that followed in his wake, struggling to keep up. Zannah was only ten, a waif of a girl with short, curly blond hair. Her clothing was simple and plain to the point of being rustic: a loose-fitting white shirt and faded blue coveralls, both torn and stained from weeks of continuous wear. Anyone who saw her scampering along after Bane’s massive, black-clad form would have been hard-pressed to imagine she was the Sith Master’s chosen apprentice. But looks could be deceiving.

  There was power in the child. He’d seen ample proof of that at their first meeting, less than an hour earlier. Two nameless Jedi were dead by her hand. Bane didn’t know all the details surrounding their deaths; he had arrived after the fact to find Zannah crying over the body of a bouncer, one of the telepathic, green-furred species native to Ruusan. The still-warm corpses of the Jedi had been sprawled beside her, their heads lolling at grotesque angles atop broken necks.

  Clearly the bouncer had been the child’s friend and companion. Bane surmised that the Jedi must have inadvertently killed the bouncer, only to meet a similar fate when Zannah exacted her revenge. Unaware of her power, they’d been caught off guard when the child—driven by mind-numbing grief and pure, abject hatred—had unleashed the full fury of the dark side on the men who’d slain her friend.

  They were victims of cruel misfortune: in the wrong place at the wrong time. Yet it would have been inaccurate to call their deaths pointless. In Bane’s eyes, at least, their sacrifice had allowed him to recognize the young girl’s potential. To some the series of events would have seemed preordained, as if the hapless Jedi had been inexorably drawn to their grim end with the sole purpose of uniting Bane and Zann
ah. No doubt there were even those who would profess that fate and the dark side of the Force had conspired to present the Master with a suitable apprentice. Bane, however, was not one of them.

  He believed in the power of the Force, but he also believed in himself: He was more than just a servant of prophecy or a pawn of the dark side, subject to the whims of an inevitable, inescapable future. The Force was a tool he had used to forge his own destiny through strength and cunning. He alone among the Sith had truly earned the mantle of Dark Lord, which was why he alone among them still lived. And if Zannah was worthy of being his apprentice, she would eventually have to prove herself, as well.

  He heard a grunt behind him and turned back to see that the girl had tumbled to the ground, falling in her haste to try to keep up with the relentless pace he’d set. She glared at him, anger etched across her features.

  “Slow down!” she snapped. “You’re going too fast!”

  Bane clenched his teeth as a fresh bolt of pain ripped through his skull. “I am not going too fast,” he replied, keeping his voice even but stern. “You are going too slow. You must find a way to keep up.”

  She scrambled to her feet, swatting at the scuffed knees of her overalls to wipe away the most obvious traces of dirt. “My legs aren’t as long as yours,” she replied crossly, refusing to back down. “How am I supposed to keep up?”

  The girl had spirit. That had been clear from the moment of their first meeting. She had recognized Bane instantly for what he was: one of the Sith, sworn enemy of the Jedi, a servant of the dark side. Yet she had shown no fear. In Zannah, Bane had seen the potential for the successor he needed, but she had obviously seen something she wanted in him, too. And when he had offered her the chance to be his apprentice, to study and learn the ways of the dark side, she hadn’t hesitated.