Ashmother
Tag:
Dreidi Xeraic
The moon had no name. It was naught but a pale, pitted face scarred by time and silence, circling a dead world in the Metalorn system. It was a place forgotten by star charts, a place that nobody remembered. Yet something had been here, and was still here. Vahlika could feel it humming beneath the crust, coiled like a serpent under stone.
Their ship touched down in silence on a barren stretch of ashen rock, far from any known coordinates. Dust curled up in spirals around their boots as the ramp descended, settling into the unnatural stillness of the place.
Vahlika stepped out first, her image a jagged silhouette of charms, ash and iron. Her helmet gleamed faintly in the moonlight, runed and battle-worn. Bones clinked from her pauldrons, a braided length of silver-blue hair knotted over one shoulder, while the fierce curve of her beskar dagger hung at her side, a blade for rites and blood alike.
She knelt and pressed her palm into the powdery earth. The sensation came like a breath drawn through a grave. A collection of old power, but ill steps. Desecration.
"The thieves' trail ends here," she muttered, voice low and rough through the modulator.
She rose in a fluid motion, bones and charms whispering together. Her gaze lingered on her new companion — a fellow practitioner, if from another path entirely. A Jedi witch. A blade of order tempered by chaos. Not one Vahlika would have trusted easily, but the scent of her power had been undeniable, and she had come willingly.
"The spirits are eager," Vahlika said, matter-of-fact, as if it were the weather. "Let us make short work of this."
