Well Of Souls

Rating: NC-17. For violence.
Warning: Lord Sidious, Master of the Sith, reflects on how he might end...
Disclaimer: Lucas and Lucasfilm own the characters, and this is for fun, to develop the character of Maul as a true sentient being, who makes his own choices, and suffers the consequences thereof.
Feedback: dark-lady@blueyonder.co.uk
Initial posting: DMEB2.

Maul’s eyes snap sharply to his Master’s face, look intently into his Master’s eyes, looking for weakness now that he was mastered in this final combat.

The whisper echoes across the room, eddies of a dark power ripple faintly across the galaxy, across Coruscant, dissipate among the stars. Jedi suddenly shiver as light momentarily dims and flickers, even time itself stops for an instant. Wings of darkness brush a tinge of fear across their souls.

The ritual words, spoken since time immemorial by the victorious once-Apprentice to the vanquished once-Master.

‘This is how it might be,’ thought Sidious, staring into the fire as his Apprentice, Lord Maul, gravely discussed the disposition of troops and armour on Naboo, made his emplacements of battle droids, and positioned the cannon.

‘I will have Rolanda Ismaren tonight,’ thought Sidious, turning away from the fire and walking to the tall window, nodding in affirmation to Maul’s soft voice explaining the latest modifications to the TIE fighters docked in the battleships above the planet. ‘She makes me feel young, once I have persuaded her.’ He wondered whether Maul had a woman and thought that perhaps even if he did, Maul abstained from congress before such an engagement, the better to hone his mind for the conflict ahead, to give him an edge and a hunger for victory. His Apprentice had that sort of mind, a monkish dedication to the tiny minutiae of ritual and correctness, a warriors dedication to the heat and chaos of battle and conquest.

By the Force, his Apprentice was powerful! It would not be many years before he was ready to challenge him for supremacy. And he would be a most worthy Sith Lord, most worthy indeed to head the order of warriors the Sith had always been. One thing was sure, Maul would attend to every minor point of his final dispatch with scrupulous attention to detail. He would be meticulous to the last second that life beat in Sidious’ body, and afterward.

As Sidious walks to his place of death, shadows appear, marching at his side, resolving slowly into the shades of ancient and hideous Sith Lords of terrible aspect and demeanour.

As he walks, Sidious extends his arms, places his palms upwards as if to receive some terrible benediction. The shadows support him, touch him, make a comforting shroud of Dark Force. They promise life beyond this, and a yet greater power than he has ever wielded in his mortal state.

The former Apprentice walks solemnly behind him, and the plain wooden coffin follows, borne upon a small repulsor-lift Maul bears the flint knife, made by his own hands and sharper than a razor. The knife is new, it has been blessed and consecrated, it rests upon a bed of bitter herbs in a plain silver bowl which is carried carefully in both his slender hands. All has been ritually purified in the hidden sanctuary of Naga Sadow on the temple world of Korriban, where ancient and dead Sith Lords tread the hallowed halls in fearful majesty.

The Temple Wardens, having made the few and discreet preparations necessary, have retreated to their cells. To wait out the time until the ceremonies are over.

The small cortege reaches the Place of Sacrifice, and Sidious stands before the great altar, and faces the Nameless Stone. The Nameless Stone is a smooth piece of hard polished granite the length and width of a burly man. There is a hollowed place in the Stone where a body might lie... There is a gutter under the place where the neck might be when the head rests upon the carved stone pillow… The gutter leads to a runnel in the stone floor, which itself leads to a well…

Sidious trails his hand over the cold polished surface and recalls how the life-blood of his own master had leapt so willingly from the severed vein, and run so eagerly into the runnel, and so to the well. He sighs, and composes himself, for death is not attractive, and there is much he wishes to accomplish, but now he is at his end, and the rule of the order must be obeyed or chaos will ensue. He turns to Maul, and removes his hood, thus revealing himself to his apprentice for the first and lonly time.

Maul kneels to his Master for the last time, asks for his blessing and benediction before they part in love and friendship. Gladly and graciously does Sidious dispense the sacrament, and as he receives it, Maul bows his head in deference and prostrates himself before him for the last time, then he stands and waits while Sidious disrobes and composes himself upon the Stone…

‘Another ‘last time’’ muses Sidious, ‘All will be for the last time’. ‘This’ will be for the last time, then ‘that’ will be for the last time, then all will be no more and I will have drunk of life itself ‘for the last time’. I will have tasted my concubines ‘for the last time’, I will have eaten the most delectable of foods ‘for the last time’, taken the finest of wines, ‘for the last time’, and I will be alone with this creature as never before, ‘for the last time.’

‘Do creatures have souls?’ wonders Sidious, turning to Maul, ‘How will he feel when he stands behind me with the knife…’

Maul’s soul sings in triumph as he stands at his Master’s head, looks at Sidious’ throat extended for slaughter, sees the artery pulsing gently with life, sees the granite trough ready to take the blood into the Well. The Well is named the Well of Souls. It’s depth is unmeasured, ancient Sith Lore reasons that the souls of the sacrificed masters lurk within it’s very depths, carousing in happy and drunken manner until called by those Lords still bound to common matter.

“Journey well, Master,” whispers Maul, holding the knife over the throat. The stone knife, sharper than glass, keener than metal, is unwavering in his left hand.

‘My own Master did not resist his demise’ recalls the elder Sith Lord, gesturing to Maul to continue his dissertation. ‘Neither shall I resist my own – indeed, mine will be a noble and dignified end, leading as it does to the final knowledge of all things.’

“Make it quick, my son,” commands Sidious, extending his chin, flexing his hands as he closes his eyes and surrenders to the dark.

‘I know how I felt, standing behind my own vanquished Master in similar manner,’ thinks Sidious as he asks Maul to clarify his intentions regarding the Queen of Naboo. What chant will he make to call the shades of our predecessors as witness to my passing?’

Maul wondered what preoccupied his Master, but he continued nevertheless. His Master's mind was cloaked, impenetrable, he could discern nothing of his Master's mind or mood.

Maul’s right hand is laid with all due ceremony across his Master’s brow, his left holds the flint knife, poised at the right of the throat ready to make the killing blow.

A temple rat scurries across the flagstones as he begins a ritual chant. As he commences, his voice is soft and husky, as he starts to gather the skeins of dark power from the air around him. He creates a rhythm into the chant, and the sound starts to echo from the walls, bouncing back, reverberating and increasing. Then the words echo from the roof, start to swirl around the main hall. He builds a power into the chant, pulls more at the darkness, weaves the dark power into the fabric of the song itself.

The chant is hypnotic, the insistent rhythm dulls his senses, and Sidious’ mind floats. As he drifts, he reflects that this is how it will have been for his own master. Then he listens. The chant is varying from that prescribed by ritual. The softly voiced chant speaks of victories, Sidious’ victories.

The chant speaks of sacrifice, and sings of triumph, it tells Sidious of his mighty place in the galaxy, of his awesome power, used to the glory of the Sith.

For a tiny moment, a very tiny moment, Sidious feels unworthy of the praise afforded him in the chant. He reminds himself – has he not carried the banner of the Sith Order for the last centuries, alone? Was such praise not due? And his heart grew warm, and he was well pleased with how he had comported himself in the service of his Order.

“Live forever, my Master,” whispers Maul, as he stares for a moment at the white throat stretched before him, then he realises a savage and feral joy as he slashes the knife quickly and cleanly across the neck, cutting the windpipe and artery together.

‘Does time itself stand still, while a power such I now wield changes hands? Is a nexus in the continuum created by actions such as these?’

Sidious reflects for a moment on the preparations made by his Apprentice. This coming time is a nexus for the Sith. He has examined the dark skeins of probability in the Force, pulled at the threads of the future, but nothing is revealed to him. He can sense only chaos and a dimly revealed presence seated in the midst of that chaos, neither masculine nor feminine. Of whom or what he cannot distinguish.

This nexus of time envelops Naboo then, and it is a nexus where chaos and chance reign supreme. As Maul told him that nothing had been left to chance, he wonders, is someone rolling chance cubes, playing with probability and gambling upon the outcome of events?

The blood leaps into the air, then falls back into the trough, spilling onto Maul’s hands as it does so. He has pushed back the sleeves of his tunic for this work, but even so, the cuffs are spattered with the bright red blood. He dips a finger into the trough, tastes the blood and thus imbibes a little of his Master’s waning power as he does so, then he waits with bowed head as the body drains, becomes white.

‘All is blood, and death, and a gathering dark in which that blood will be spilled’, thinks Sidious, as the evening shadows gather. ‘The blood of the guilty, the blood of the innocent, perhaps even the blood of the Sith’. My blood when it is time… All my blood, when it is time…

Meanwhile, in the dark Hall of Masters, something is happening at the edges of the shadows. The rats are scurrying nervously here and there, and stop suddenly, sniff the air, their tender snouts shivering. They circle the bowl of blood that draws them so irresistibly, that has taunted them for centuries, so near yet unreachable. The darkness is heavy with sounds, sleek body gliding against sleek body, sharp claws scrabbling over the stone floor, a snarling fight or piercing wail now and then.

The unexpected sound hushes the creatures, they freeze in their places, unsure, poised to run, poised to flee, yet drawn irresistibly by the thought of a feast to come. In the ensuing silence the sigh that passes over the Hall and the entire Temple is clearly audible. And then

A young daring rat is the first to sniffle at the drops of the dark liquid oozing from the cracked goblet of the Halqua, placed there by Sidious so many years ago. His offering of blood...

In but a moment, the goblet and the entire stone slab is buried beneath a swarm of frantically wriggling, snarling, biting bodies. They hunger and there is sustenance! There is blood!

The unfortunate young rat who got the first taste of the feast, is also the first to fall prey to his once comrades: in their bloodlust, they do not recoil from devouring one of their own along with a few droplets of the coveted blood that has fallen on his fur. And he is not the only one.

Claws and teeth make fast and thorough work. Then the hall is quiet again, only a few tiny skeletons decorate the floor. Torn to pieces and completely cleaned of even the memory of flesh that covered them but a few minutes ago. And the crack that runs from one edge to nearly the middle of the hand-shaped crystal goblet, still has a reddish or yellowish hue to it:

He kisses the marble-like lips of the dead Sith Lord, and prepares the body for inhumation. He washes the body, clothes it in a black shroud girdled with a simple black belt to which he clips Sidious’ lightsabre, then the black cloak, and the hood carefully drawn over the face. Finally, he places the body reverently in the stone sarcophagus, hewn by Sidious himself many centuries ago in preparation for this final day. He places the body upright, to face the dark proudly, as a conqueror, not lying in humble submission under the heel of dust, and decay.

Maul kneels at the head of his Master’s tomb. Head bowed, hands clasped in front of him, he waits while Sidious spirit fully leaves his body, joins the pantheon of Sith gods, and is received into the Well of Souls in song and celebration. When it is over, he rises, looks down the long hallway of darkened shadows and looming pillars. Raises his arms as a tremendous power surges up through him, transfixes him in ecstasy.

Then the feeling wanes as the power embeds in his soul, buries itself in his dark heart.

He rises, and looks around, then walks imperiously down the Hall of Masters, boot heels clicking against the stones, towards the dark, towards his kingdom and dominion, to take his inheritance.

He owns such power as mortal man can never know, or even dream of, and he will use it.

And this is how it might be, imagines Sidious, as his pupil bends the knee before him, asks for his blessing before he departs to Naboo where Jedi wait to slay him.

The Well Of Souls.

by

Dark Lady and Red