Sworded Tales

The young Falleen boy sighed with contentment.  Looking down over the rim of the plateau on which he was perched permitted him the dazzling and disorienting view of the sun cracked plains below.  The cool night air raced up the cliff face and whipped his thin scalp lock out behind him in an erratic dance.  How he loved the Arkadian Steppes and the serenity they induced.  He often dreamed of leaving behind his heritage and running free amidst the outcroppings and wildlife of the arid Steppes.

“They are moving away,” came a firm voice from directly behind the boy.  The timbre of those words carried authority and confidence, and well they should.  This rugged Falleen man was S’Ranas Issquau, teacher and protector to the young charge crouching before him.  Lowering the binoculars from his face, the pale orange eyes of S’Ranas fell upon the young countenance as it turned to face him, and the man marveled at the peace this place brought to such a troubled mind.

“I thought you said we wouldn’t see another soul tonight,” mocked the boy mildly.

S’Ranas stared into the smoky gray eyes of the youngest noble child of house Seris’th and felt nothing but love for this chaotic soul who some had deemed a wild-eyed terror.  True, this boy had caused his fair share of trouble, but didn’t all children?  S’Ranas thought of his own youth and could not stifle a light chuckle.

“Skelsar,” he addressed the boy, “That is precisely what troubles me.  There shouldn’t be anyone else out here tonight.”

“But why does it bother you so much?” the boy retorted, “The potency of your anxiety often makes my eyes water.”

S’Ranas stared at Skelsar, willing himself into a calmer more focused state before responding.  “Those unknown individuals are no more disturbing to me than your incessant need to perch so close to the cliff face.”

Skelsar, taking his teacher’s subtle cue, quietly glided away from the eighty foot drop back toward their small camp.  As the boy entered the circle of light thrown by the glowstones, S’Ranas continued his lecture.  “The persons in question themselves are not what disturbs me.  The fact that they are out of place, that they have disturbed the relative order of travel protocols, is far more distressing.”

“But that’s exactly what we’re doing!” exclaimed Skelsar, knowing full well that if his mother found out he was visiting the Arkadian Steppes without the family’s permission he would suffer severely.

“You are yet too young to fully comprehend that all manner of things have a purpose in the great order.  It is the understanding of when something exists outside of its place, outside of its purpose, that one begins to grasp the intricacies of place, purpose and the role of the nobility.”

Skelsar lowered his head and stared into the glow of the stones.  How those two words, place and purpose, vexed him.  Every waking moment was spent trying to maximize your place within the family hierarchy and your purpose within the noble order.  He was sickened and infuriated at the same time.  It was not as if he chose to be born into house Seris’th!  To him, the whole caste system amounted to about as much as a heaping pile of Ramek dung.

“Our purpose here is in furthering your education as I have seen fit, and while my advanced years may afford me some degree of flexibility within the family order, there are times when one must step outside of his place to accomplish a greater good,” S’Ranas paused before adding, “That is the difference between us…and yon travelers.  Although I cannot speak for their motives.”

Now eleven years later, Skelsar can remember those words, that night, with haunting clarity.  As fate would have it, the motives of those particular ‘yon travelers’ were nothing short of utterly wiping out house Seris’th and ending a conflict that had been raging before Skelsar was even born.

House Pas’tuas existed as a long line of warrior Falleen whose clans were renown for honoring the ways of the past and the heroic fallen of their lineage.  House Seris’th represented a fundamental change in the structure of Falleen society, moving towards a more diplomatic and non-hostile means of evolution.  For nearly two decades the opposed houses fought to achieve their socio-political goals, until that night when house Pas’tuas chose to end the debate in one swift, violent stroke.

News of the family assassination reached S’Ranas’ ears long before either he or the boy laid eyes on Seris’th Manorhouse.  Making the boy understand what had happened was another matter all together.  The aging Falleen’s explanation was simple, efficient and orphaning.  S’Ranas had sequestered them on a rooftop before conveying the horrific news to Skelsar for two reasons.  First, he did not want the boy’s reaction to generate a localized scent that the assassins could easily detect.  And second, he wanted the boy to be able to see the truth for himself.

“Here,” S’Ranas said offering Skelsar the binoculars after the boy’s first wave of sorrow had passed, “A little more than a hundred meters to the northwest.”

For long, painful minutes the boy stood rigid watching several squads of Guardians cordoning off the area around his home and removing the bodies of his family for transport to an investigation facility.

“Take as long as you like, Skelsar.  But the sooner we relocate, the better chance we’ll have of getting clear.”

“Relocate?!” Skelsar shrieked, “That’s my home!  That’s my family!  I’m going to find who did this and–”

“Skelsar.”

“–turn them inside out. I’m going–”

“Skelsar.”

“–to teach them all–”

“Skelsar!” S’Ranas barked.  The boy stared at his teacher in dismay and confusion, and then his anger broke and a fresh wave of grief smashed into him with tidal force.  S’Ranas caught the collapsing boy and held him firmly allowing their shared sorrow to spill over in unison.

Whispering soothingly, S’Ranas continued, “Now is not the time, and this is not the place.  You must use this time to honor your family, to remember them at their finest and to help guide them along the path of your ancestors.”

So it was that S’Ranas lead Skelsar into the more remote regions of Falleen to hide from the predators that had surely discovered the boy’s absence from the grisly plans that had been laid for house Seris’th.  Through the long weeks and months ahead, Skelsar’s education continued, but along entirely new paths.  Gone was the need to prepare the boy for the courtly proceedings to which he was originally intended.  His destiny was uncertain, his life endangered.  S’Ranas began teaching the boy how to survive.

For nearly eight months the banished pair managed to elude detection and capture, but S’Ranas new that were they to stay on Falleen much longer, the boy would likely not live to see his adulthood.

With little wealth to their names, S’Ranas and Skelsar managed to negotiate transport off of Falleen aboard a Bothese diplomatic transport by signing on for a year of indentured service.  The pair found themselves working in a relatively non-hostile setting as training tools of a diplomatic branch within the Bothese government.  The unique ability of the Falleen to influence those around them with various chemical secretions was not lost on their new masters.  Although the work was not overly demanding, both Skelsar and S’Ranas found the notion of attempting to outwit, influence and beguile various Bothan dignitary trainees day in and day out somewhat tiresome.

As the year of servitude approached an end, the Bothans offered gainful employment to both of the Falleen, but the feeling of a symbiotic relationship was not mutual.  Both S’Ranas and Skelsar were looking forward to moving on and to sequestering themselves from the prodding ways of the non-Falleen species for a while.

The arid wastes of Tatooine offered the sanctuary desired and sparked a reminiscence of their home world that put both Falleen at peace for a number of years.

When the time came to move on, the journey lead them into the core worlds where they succeeded in vanishing amidst the throngs of peoples and species for a time.  What sent them back to Tatooine was the simple fact that S’Ranas was dying.  Neither of them spoke of it, but the smell was one that could not be denied.

S’Ranas took them on one last journey to Mon Calamari to see the two native species interact and perhaps shed some light on the origins of the Falleen themselves. There time there was short as S’Ranas decayed quickly, but Skelsar was able to get his one true friend, the only other individual to know the truth of his origins, back to the world that was as close to home as either of them had been in their eight years of exile.

After sending S’Ranas down the path to meet his ancestors, Skelsar, now sixteen, decided it was time to begin rebuilding, to stop running and to turn and face what the future would hold for him, come what may.

For three years, much of this time spent on Dantooine, Skelsar moved more freely among the various species, learning, listening and waiting.  And though the loneliness that some times befell him during the darkening hours of the evening was at times all but unbearable, he knew and understood that patience…and vigilance would guide him. He only had to wait for the sign…