THE LONELY LORD

Lord Sern just finished her daily routine outside of the balcony. Like before, the woman was practicing her lightsaber combat under the rain for a good amount of time. Captain Quinn and the apprentice Jaesa Willsaam entered the stronghold through the elevator, the companion Vette cheerfully explained that Leena won't enter until she was done – and how she was able to do this for the past years since they first moved in.

As the apprentice and the companion have their nice chatter about their Lord, Quinn observed her carefully through the window. He didn't need the Force to feel what the Sith Lord is feeling, he could see the complete frustration and focus in her eyes. It was already odd – a Sith without those corrupted yellowish eyes. A Sith who spared and killed Jedi during her off-world campaigns.

He wasn't one to mingle with Sith politics. Being Sith means that one must survive not only against their enemies but rather with each other. Unlike the Jedi who supported each other regardless of their level of influence and power, the Sith can either support each other for survival or the same ideologies for the benefit of the Empire. Or they could kill each other, marking each and everyone as a potential threat or use them as a puppet, a weapon.

"Vette, who's that?" Jaesa curiously asked, catching the attention of the Imperial Captain. Both of them turned their gaze onto the small hologram by one of the shelves. A Sith Lord who stood tall and proud, yet there was a sense of kindness and mercy much like their Lord Sern.

"Oh, that." Vette's smile dropped as she turned around to see the hologram. "That's Arrun Zaine. He was an influential Sith Lord."

"Oh, so he was close to the Master?" Jaesa tilted her head in confusion. It sounded like praise and yet, she could sense the sadness within the Twi'lek companion.

"They were married for a time." They were bound to know one day. The blue Twi'lek wondered if Leena was able to move on in the past few months, but even time like that cannot erase the painful and happy memories they had throughout the years. "They were married because Leena's Master insisted it. She knew Baras was going to do something and Arrun also knew it. But—"

"He played along and it cost him his life." The two of them turned to see the Sith Lord soaked and wet from her routine outside. The Twi'lek couldn't even look at her in the eye, even she didn't want to remember the horror Baras did that day. "Baras armed slaves and attacked after the ceremony. Killing the apprentices of Darth Occlus as they were in a silent war against each other – and we were in the middle of it. The Dark Council publicly stated that it was a terrorist attack but everyone knew that it was a power game between two influential Dark Lords and Baras won."

"And… you did nothing?" Jaesa asked.

The Sith Lord looked into the eyes of her apprentice and answered calmly. "Only a fool would go against Baras within the shadows. Some Lords would say that the Sith are more powerful than the Jedi because we are not afraid to feel. We embrace the spectrum of emotions. From the heights of transcendent joy to the depths of hatred and despair. Sith welcomes whatever paths the dark side sets us on, and whatever destiny it lays out for us. The dark side is only for those who value the use of self-determinism over all else existence can offer, Sith tend to focus on the acquisition of power – but to be united by hatred is a fragile alliance at best. Arrun knew that he knew the dangers of going against Baras – Lord Zaine fought nobly, Lord Zaine fought bravely but Lord Zaine died."

"Arrun was a good man," Vette spoke out, breaking the tensional silence that surrounds them.

"Good men don't live long in the galaxy, Vette. Look at my husband." Leena's words were rather stuck with them as she left for her room.

To understand someone is to understand their failures, and for one so young such as the newly named Lord Sern – she claims to have made a lot of them. But she was not just a Sith Lord, she's also a woman who was driven by the ideas of hatred and emotion – the drive of vengeance for everything she had suffered for. The dark is generous towards her, after all.

Everybody knows that everybody dies, and no one knew it like Lord Sern.

Some say that she's everything that all Masters would want in the Order. And like other lords, she would have adventures but she could never have a life of fulfillment because she feels lonely. That's how she is. People would look at her eyes and see hatred. There was no true victory for her. She's just a woman with lightsabers and a helmet. A woman without a home.

She lost almost everything to becoming a Sith. Her family, her husband, people who stood by her and the Sith Lord didn't want to lose those who stand by her now. Being a Lord of a Sith was always so much more – a sum of knowledge, a code, a shared history –shared suffering.

The lonely Lord.

In the end, she was just getting tired. Tired of the endless struggle. Tired of losing everyone that mattered to her, tired watching the blood spread through the ground. But she can remember how Arrun was, she can remember it painfully and never fondly. She knew what Baras was and she didn't continue to stop it.

She believes she killed him.

When her doors opened, the Sith Lord turned around to find the young apprentice standing there nervously. "Master, are you alright?"

"What do you think, Jaesa?" The Sith Lord asked, placing her gloves down on the table as she turned to the apprentice standing by her doors. The former Padawan carefully looked around the bedroom, to find a Jedi Holocron on the desk by her Master's lightsabers and the gloves. "It hurts." The Master admitted. "It hurts, the noise in my head – it's like a drumbeat. A never-ending drumbeat. A sound of a heart. The heartbeat of a Sith Lord. Have you ever experienced that when the Jedi took you in? The conflicting voices in your mind. The conflicted feelings in your heart. Do they bother you? Were they killing you inside?"

"I don't know." The apprentice answered gently as she stood by her Master. The Sith Lord, troubled by her own feelings – wanting to embrace both sides and yet, a strong conflict lives inside of her. She could feel it. Every bit of the pain, the regret – the sadness, the sorrow, and the merciful tendencies, the small amount of happiness and giggles. "Perhaps we'll never know."

"The Force has a plan," Leena mumbled, which caught the apprentice's attention. "That's what my husband used to tell me all the time. That the Force has a plan for everyone and it had great plans for me. I didn't believe in him. I always thought that it would be best if the mysteries of the Force remain a mystery."

"What's changed?"

"Time, I suppose." She didn't know if it would stop, the noise in her head. The noise came from a Jedi, a Jedi she hasn't seen nor met at all.

A Jedi with the same shade of eyes as hers. Both of them heard it, the rhythm, the noise in their heads – the never-ending drums.

The drum is the beating of two hearts. To save the tears for a sad song, nothing is sad until it's over. No second chances in a life like this, a life of a Sern. "Tell me, Jaesa. Do you know a Jedi Master named Cyrus?"

"Master Cyrus?" Jaesa's surprised tone gave the Sith Lord the confirmation she needed. "When… when I was presented to the Jedi Council, I was introduced to Master Cyrus who believed that my powers can be used for the greater good. He told me that I had… something special."

Sounds like him. Leena mentally sighed. "What do you know about that Jedi Master Cyrus?"

"I… know that he was so gifted with the Force that he was named a Jedi Master before his older brother could."

The Sith Lord paused before she could even say a word, she turned to the apprentice to meet those familiar brown eyes of hers. She was young, luckily the young girl was honest with her Master. There was this sense of trust towards each other – the Sith Lord didn't know if she should be glad that her apprentice had this towards her. Then again, she did demonstrate merciful tendencies towards those who were important to her.

Master Yonlach who showed the young apprentice her full potential with her powers, a powerful Jedi Master of his own right and ironically – the Master of Zylas Sern when she used to be a Padawan. A student who he claims he had failed. She saved Jaesa's parents for servitude and promised protection as well as riches under the care of the Empire and her Master, though the Sith Lord could never know what's in her Master's mind. Then there was Nomen Karr, a Jedi Master who had the complete force of the Dark Side and yet she allowed him to go home to his Order without any second thoughts.

It had something to do with Baras, but now that her power is growing and growing – the Sith Lord needed to be more careful around her Master as much as she needed to be careful around the voices of Cyrus. No one could really explain how the Force works in mysterious ways – for her to be connected to a Jedi with no other affiliation towards her, it was just troublesome and confusing.

"Were your Masters kind to you?" The Sith Lord asked, having her eyes locked on her apprentice's brown hues. She knew that the Jedi have more patience with their trainees, having their younglings disciplined and their Padawan's well taught before given to their Masters.

Jaesa nodded quietly as a response. "Good." Leena smiled as she stood up, gently patting the girl on the head – much like what Arrun would do whenever she used to be nervous. "I expect great things from you – and I shall not be disappointed."

Jaesa returned a warm smile. "Of course, Master."

"If you have any difficulty adjusting to the lifestyle in Dromand Kaas – don't hesitate to come to me, understood?" It was as if her sadness disappeared when she returned a smile. It was motherly towards the apprentice, and Jaesa respects that.

There were genuine care and concern in the Master's voice. Master Karr would show something similar towards her but the apprentice is still confused if Nomen Karr did really care about her or only saw her as a weapon to bring down his most hated rival.

As much as Nomen Karr wanted to deny it, Leena knew that he was the same as her Master. Only using their apprentices as a potential weapon to destroy one another. The endless and eventual end for a Sith in power.