Ascension/Part 1

1,386 BBY (Day 118 of the Occupation of Milagro)

Darth Saleej did not answer the question at once, but Rhutizh'chal'safan knew better than to speak again without invitation. He simply stood, hands folded, before his master's throne, watching the masked face rather than suggest weakness by looking away. Like Rhutizh's, Darth Saleej's hood was raised and shadowed his face under the bridge's red light, but unlike Rhutizh, Saleej's yellow eyes gleamed out of the darkness. They studied the floor as the Kaleesh Sith Overlord tapped the claws of his two first fingers together.

"You are certain he will die, Lord Rhutizh?"

The Devaronian Sith Lord bowed; his horns tented his hood over his brow. "Today, Master. Perhaps tomorrow; Zhellday of this week at the very latest.  The window is narrow, and the result is certain."

"A result not due to anything untoward, I hope?"

The Council's way is the only way; how many times had Rhutizh heard Darth Saleej say those words? "My eyes do not see all things, Master, nor do my ears hear all secrets. But if there is any hand at work other than the inescapable one, I know nothing of it."

Darth Saleej pondered a moment more before he turned his throne away and rose, pacing toward the viewport. The Unquenchable Fire ' s auxiliary bridge looked out over Dalcretti and the ruins of its defensive force; some of the hulks would be salvageable and could be repurposed as Sith warships, Rhutizh was given to understand, but many were as pockmarked and cratered as Darth Hokhtan's face, and would never fly again. But even those would be used for scrap metal; victory had not made Darth Saleej wasteful despite his progress into the Inner Rim and the fall of Taanab, and he employed every resource available to keep the cutting edge of his fleet razor-sharp and to ensure proper tribute flowed back to the heart of the Empire. Rhutizh thought this self-sufficiency and ingenuity, more than anything else, was the foremost reason the Council of Five placed such trust in his master.

A Council, Rhutizh had learned, that would soon be down to four.

Rhutizh followed his master to the viewport, leaving a respectful distance between them. Saleej's hooded head rotated to follow a halved cruiser as it drifted by in the distance; Rhutizh thought he was not really seeing it, but he would never dare to reach out to his master's thoughts to be sure. Another moment passed by…

"To answer your question, my lord," the cool voice said, "Darth Hokhtan."

Rhutizh did not move. "Darth Hokhtan."

One of Darth Saleej's clawed hands gestured to the battlescape over Dalcretti. "When I was a young man, breaching the Inner Rim was considered fantasy; merely to speak of it was to reveal oneself an idealist unfit for serious command. Now we are here—now I have done this thing.  Our momentum can not be lost, especially when Lady Gasald seems to have failed us in the south."

If Darth Saleej was pleased by Gasald's loss of Milagro—pleased to see a rival stumble, and the woman even Rhutizh suspected had set Hokhtan, Alecto, and Vandak up for failure fail in her turn—his cold tone did not convey it. To the extent that he betrayed any emotion at all, it sounded like annoyance. Darth Saleej had envisioned a grand conquest, with his fleet and Gasald's boxing in the Slice; even indolent Lord Osydro had a role to play, mopping up resistance between the lines of war. If Gasald's stumble became a fall, what would become of the plan?

Of course, if she fell, what would become of her overlordship…?

"I trust you understand, Lord Rhutizh."

"As you will it, Master." The words flowed so naturally that Rhutizh thought even Darth Saleej would hear none of the acid boiling in his gut. Darth Hokhtan was a masterful commander, of course, and powerful in the dark side, but if one was to be elevated above the other…

"You know of Lord Gy-Rond, of course," Darth Saleej said.

"Of course, Master." Artius Gy-Rond, the aged Human Sith Lord who, like Darth Saleej and Vedya Gasald, was a Sith Overlord, but unlike them held no territory. Lord Gy-Rond's domain was not of space but of activity; he ruled Sith Intelligence, and upon a time it was said that every shadow informed for him. Even Rhutzih was indebted to him for some resources and abilities, and much as he had aspired to build a spynet independent of Gy-Rond's, he could not always be certain which of his eyes saw for more than one mind. Of late, though, he had been less concerned; if more eyes than his watched his web at work, Rhutizh was confident those other eyes had grown rheumy and tired.

"His age is becoming a liability," Darth Saleej mused. "The keenest mind, like the keenest blade, can still rust when it hangs too long on a mantle as a trophy of remembered glories."

Rhutizh said nothing, wary for a trap and wondering whether his master could be suggesting what it seemed he was suggesting. Was there, then, a way besides—

"There is no way but the Council's way," Darth Saleej declared; Rhutizh barely contained a start, and dared not ask whether his master had read his thoughts. "But it is not unheard of for Sith who have served beyond their utility to be gifted fiefs upon which to retire. The Council of Five remembers those who have served in faith; its way is not merely punishment for the treacherous, but rewards for fealty."

And if a Sith so rewarded should resist his retirement, Rhutizh mused, such defiance would be treachery and liable to punishment… The Council's will could not be subverted.

Darth Saleej turned away from the viewport; the light of dayside Dalcretti threw his hooded face into silhouette in the red-lit bridge, but his yellow eyes still burned through his face mask. "Do you take my meaning, Lord Rhutizh?"

Rhutizh understood Lord Gy-Rond would not be disposed of, for to strike at an anointed Sith was not the Council's way. But… "I take your meaning, Master."

The yellow eyes burned brighter; the slit pupils were not merely the absence of light, but a solid reality like dark matter—like windows opening onto the dark side. "A lord of spies can be patient, can he not, Lord Rhutizh?"

"Every spy must be patient, Master," Rhutizh agreed, concealing his satisfaction behind a tone of pleasant agreeability. "Plans and schemes take time to come to fruition, and haste makes ruin."

"Indeed it does, my lord," Darth Saleej replied, turning back to face Dalcretti. "Indeed it does."