First Reply Home, Sweet Home

[Darth Virelia]

"Blast from the past."

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The wine shimmered violet in her glass, catching the chandeliers' fractured glow as if liquid starlight had been poured just for her. Chandrila had always known how to mask itself in softness: rolling meadows, cultured vineyards, the subtle architecture that gave the illusion of freedom even as the capital thrummed with bureaucratic chains. To be home again was… dangerous. Dangerous for them, exhilarating for her.

Darth Virelia reclined at the heart of her gathering, half-lounged in an obsidian-backed chair that had been imported just for the occasion. The ballroom was not hers—it never would be, in name—but its bones bent toward her gravity all the same. Chandrilan senators, merchants, off-world delegates, even a handful of Galactic Alliance officers had drifted through her doors, each drawn by the simple lure of decadence. Wine flowed, silken music swept across the vaulted space, and laughter sparkled like chandeliers. Yet beneath it all, an unease breathed. People could sense when a predator smiled too kindly.

Her armor was gone tonight, replaced with a gown of black silk traced with threads of violet fire. The fabric clung like smoke, cut low and daring, revealing just enough to keep every gaze from straying too long elsewhere. Her six-eyed mask rested on the table beside her glass, more ornament than threat here, though its presence was reminder enough. Chandrila had tried to bury her once. Now she drank in its heart without fear.

She let her neon eyes wander over the room. A senator's aide lingered by the balcony, trying and failing to avoid her attention. A Corellian trader whispered in the corner, already loose-lipped from spiced brandy. An officer in crisp Alliance blues raised his glass toward her with awkward bravado, unaware of how much she already knew about his mistress, his debts, his weakness. Every soul here had brought her a gift, whether they realized it or not. Secrets spilled as easily as wine when the music was gentle and the hostess patient.

Her lips curved as she sipped. Patience was her true vintage. She tasted oak, spice, a hint of something floral, but the flavor that mattered was the tension in the room. These people did not yet understand that they had already been catalogued, mapped, weighed. Chandrila had raised her. The Jedi thought it had cast her out. Both were wrong. She was the inevitable return, the violet ember rekindled among their fields of green.

A string of laughter broke too loudly at her left, and she turned her gaze upon the group of courtiers who had dared forget themselves. Their mirth faltered mid-breath beneath her quiet smile, replaced with the polite terror of prey who remembers what shadow they share a den with. She raised her glass in mock-benediction, releasing them. The music swelled again.

Tonight was not conquest. Tonight was courtship. Yet even as she played the gracious hostess, Virelia knew Chandrila itself was already yielding—one secret, one glance, one sip of wine at a time.

 

[Darth Vinaze]

Darth Virelia

The dark, smoke-filled lounge was a tangled web of bodies, secrets, and lies. In the darkness, one could lose themselves, physically and mentally, and that was Virelia's intent, as she watched them keenly, knowing all about them while they remained ignorant. It was the kind of crowd that a single hooded figure could move through unabated, like a shadow dancing with the red and purple light, from corner to corner of the room. Like the hostess, the shadow observed.

Eventually she would catch his gaze from across the room as he stared at her, his head lifting to reveal a devious grin beneath his black hood. His smile would fade, and his silhouette be lost once more in the crowd, then he would approach her.

"Lord Virelia," a voice croaked from beneath the hood, "you are in good health and spirits since the struggle on Desevro." The Prophet made light of their lavish surroundings and the general mood of the evening.

"I suspect you may have only an inkling of who I am, but I have been watching you, The Empire has been watching you. Welcome to our domain."

Vinaze in truth did not know Virelia beyond what his spies could bring forth about her, and she had built for herself quite the facade of anonymity. But he'd seen her demonstration of power at the Sith Conclave, and wondered what the rogue Sith could be doing on a newly occupied Imperial world. She was not one of the ruling Sith Lords of the Empire. Not yet. Chandrila was a staunchly pro-democracy world, diametrically opposed to their new masters, and a rogue Sith Lord with a reputation such as hers, of subterfuge and corruption, being in the mix did not bode well for the Empires plans to dominate Chandrila...