Private Seeking New Alternatives

[Darth Virelia]

"To be, or not to be."

Tags - Calyx Sundrift

Pleasure had a taste on Zeltros—honeyed, acrid, cloying, depending on how far one let it seep. For most, it was the sweetest of poisons. For Virelia, it was background noise. The air itself was laced with pheromones and the pulse of music, the streets stitched together with neon and temptation, but none of it could touch the discipline of her mind. She let the tide wash over her, violet eyes half-lidded behind a porcelain half-mask, and allowed the world to believe her merely another patron chasing indulgence.

The Dark Court had no true roots here yet. That suited her. She preferred Zeltros as it was—a neutral stage no matter who 'offically' owned it, a place where information traded faster than credits. Rumours thrived here in a way even spice dens could not replicate. They clung to dancers' tongues, seeped from the mouths of drunk off-world merchants, and passed through the lazy laughter of smugglers on borrowed couches. She had come for one in particular: a story of a Jedi who had fallen, vanished into velvet shadows and never returned to their Order.

A figure like that was worth the hunt. Not because she needed another apprentice—though such a tool was never wasted—but because it spoke to her long game. A Jedi who had tasted the fracture between faith and reality could become a wedge, or a weapon, or a mirror. Whispers said this exile had been seen among the lower halls of Zeltros' entertainment quarters, drifting between revels, carrying scars that were not only physical.

Virelia passed beneath a canopy of lightstrips, their flicker glancing off the plates of her Tyrant's Embrace, disguised beneath a silken over-robe dyed a deep wine hue. She kept the armor muted, quieted through alchemical veils; to those who brushed against her in the crowd, she was only another patron in finery. Only when she moved did the weight of presence linger—enough to draw glances, never long enough for alarm.

She entered a lounge of polished crystal and low couches, a place that thrummed with bass notes deep enough to stir the ribs. Dancers turned their bodies into weapons of persuasion, each gesture coaxing more intoxicated laughter from the crowd. Virelia ignored them. She scanned the periphery—the gamblers at the sabacc tables, the Zeltron courtesans whispering to their charges, the slouching pilots who pretended they still had coin left.

Somewhere here the thread would reveal itself.

 

[Calyx Sundrift]

The jukebox in the corner warbled out a jizz tune, barely audible over the din of voices raised in lively debate. The bar was packed, patrons wedged into leather booths while the overflow crowded the standing-room floor, drinks sloshing in hand. By the holo-pool table, a rowdy group erupted in cheers as one of them sank a difficult shot, the electric crack of the holo-cue ball cutting through the smoky air. The bartender rewarded the victory with a tray of tequila shots, their sharp scent biting at the warmth of the room.

For now, it was relatively quiet. In half an hour the place would thrum with the brass and swing of a famed big-band. After that came comedy hour. Low profile as it was, the bar always did well.

Calyx lounged in one of the old, scratched vinyl booths that wrapped around a small round table. His booth, always reserved, had the one thing no others did. A clear line of sight to all three exits. The front door, the back, and the smuggler’s hatch behind the bar.

Reserved for Kanjiklub. Specifically their newest asset.

Calyx Sundrift.

Consigliere of the Zeltros branch.

He still wasn’t used to the title, but evenings like this suited him fine. Show your face, strike a deal or two, maybe indulge in a little trouble or some frisky action. Then call it a night.

His cocktail arrived, the vibrant red drink topped with a lime wedge and sugared rim. Calyx tipped his glass in a subtle nod to the Zeltron server, a man about his age who’d learned unbuttoned shirts meant heavier tips. He’d make a note to track him down later.

Across the table sat his companion - another Zeltron. She was alluring despite being well into her forties, and her dress left little to the imagination. Dessa, the one who ruled over Kanjiklub’s Zeltros ledgers. A single misplaced credit, and she’d drag the offender over for a reckoning.

“Any appointments tonight, Dessa?” Calyx asked.

She sifted through the holographic tabs springing from her bracer, absently swiping with one hand while keeping her wine glass impossibly steady in the other. “Nothing that concerns you, Cal. Not for the next hour, at least.”

Calyx sighed. “Got any budget for Sabacc or Pazaak?”

“No.” she answered, clipped.

“Promise I’ll win?”

“No.”

He huffed loudly, sinking into the booth like a sulking schoolboy. “Fine. I’ll just- stare longingly at my credits and imagine the winnings I could’ve had.” He raised his cocktail in mock salute and took a noisy sip, sugared rim brushing his lips.

Dessa didn’t even glance up. “That’s about all you’re good at, imagining winnings.”

“Hey! I win sometimes,” he shot back, pointing a finger with exaggerated indignation. “Once I even left a table richer than when I sat down.”

“Mm.” Dessa swirled her wine. “And then you bought three rounds for the whole cantina.”

Calyx grinned, unashamed. “Morale boost. You can’t put a price on morale.”

Her brow arched. “I can. Six thousand credits.”

He laughed, leaning back, smile still in place even as his eyes flicked, almost unconsciously, to the three exits. Charm aside, there was always calculation in his gaze. Even here, especially here, Calyx Sundrift never let his guard down.

That was when he noticed her, the woman in the wine-colored robe. She didn’t stand out enough to draw eyes, but for those who looked too long, questions came to mind. Calyx felt it before he understood it. The scent of danger. The threat in plain sight. The amulet of many grew cool against his skin, hiding his presence as he instinctively reached for the Force.

“Dessa?” His voice carried a hard edge.

She glanced up immediately, following his gaze. “Trouble?”

“Yes.” His eyes narrowed, his response flat and certain. “Invite her over. I need to know who she is and why she’s here.”

Dessa rose smoothly, but before she stepped away, Calyx added “And once you do, head straight for the exit. Put distance between you and this place. It’s that kind of trouble.”

She held his gaze for a long, worried moment. Then, with a smile carefully painted across her features, she sauntered toward the robed woman. Slow, graceful, and already playing the innocent part.

Darth Virelia

 

[Darth Virelia]

"To be, or not to be."

Tags - Calyx Sundrift

The booth's leather was old, its seams split with age, but Virelia moved as though she were reclining on a throne of marble. Her wine-colored robe whispered as she shifted, one leg crossing over the other, silk draping just enough to leave suggestion in shadow. Violet eyes gleamed faintly behind the porcelain half-mask, lit not by the bar's neon but by her own quiet storm.

She had felt the eyes on her long before the companion rose from the other booth. Men and women looked at her often—Zeltros thrived on staring—but only some had the weight behind it. This one did. That was why she lingered. Why she let the pulse of the lounge fold around her like a veil, why she ignored the dancers, the sabacc tables, the laughter spilling from mouths painted with drink. The hunt was always sharper when the prey noticed first.

The Zeltron woman approached with a smile rehearsed, glass in hand like an anchor against whatever unease stirred beneath. Virelia tilted her head a fraction, as though acknowledging the performance. Her fingers, clad in lacquered gloves, traced the rim of her untouched drink with a slowness bordering on intimate. A single nail tapped crystal, once, sharp enough to cut through the haze of conversation, then stilled.

She did not stand. She did not even shift. She let the other woman come into her gravity, into the space where every breath felt heavier, slower. Silence lingered, long enough to fray the edges of pretense.

When she finally looked up, the gesture was slow, deliberate, as if offering audience. Her gaze climbed like a hand up the body before her, measuring, weighing, discarding. At last, it reached the eyes, and there it paused—long enough to make the air between them taut.

A smile curved beneath the mask, not broad, but predatory. She leaned back in the booth, one arm draped lazily across the seat, posture all casual ownership. The robe slipped a little further from her shoulder, revealing the sculpted line of armor hidden beneath, a glimmer of obsidian edged with violet filigree. Not accident, but invitation.

She said nothing.

Instead, she let her silence press close, seductive in its refusal. The kind of silence that made one wonder what it would cost to break it, what reward or ruin might follow if one dared. Her thumb dragged idly along the rim of the glass again, slower this time, deliberate, as if the motion itself were a promise.

Only then did her lips part, her voice low, velvet-dark.

"Sit."

 

[Calyx Sundrift]

Calyx knew how to look without looking. He'd perfected the practice at Kessel, and the many sabacc tables that this galaxy counted. Yet he couldn't shake the feeling that she, this demon, knew.

The wielders of the Dark-side he'd encountered were violent and without remorse. Had she fallen in that category, he certainly would have known by now. The feeling that this had more nefarious intentions crept in.

He took a slow sip of his own drink. Sweetness with a burn of alcohol gave him temporary courage. But could he take this woman in combat, should it come down to it?

Whenever he extended his awareness, Calyx found her presence. It was oppressive and demanding, but honeyed. Seductive and alluring. No, this woman was powerful enough to destroy him before he could so much as blink.

And he'd sent Dessa straight at her.

He was out of his booth, breath held, before he'd registered himself. Dessa was in the motion of sitting down, but Calyx was over in only a couple paces.

He placed a hand on her shoulder, shook his head, then turned to the cloaked devil.

"Mind if I take her place?" He already sat down, shooing Dessa away with the little authority he could retain. That powerplay had already begun when she'd forced him over to her booth.

"Hope you like the club. It would be a shame to see it burn at the whims of an enigmatic visitor." He leaned back, crossing his legs to keep his body language open. "I would offer you a drink, but it seems you've already helped yourself. If you would give me your name, I can add it to my tab. It's the least I could offer to accomodate a beautiful woman as yourself, no?" Flattery. Perhaps that could get him far.

Darth Virelia

 

[Darth Virelia]

"To be, or not to be."

Tags - Calyx Sundrift

Her smile sharpened, not in mockery but in acknowledgment, the way a predator might allow a quarry to speak before deciding whether to toy with it or tear it apart.

Virelia did not shift when he sat. She allowed him into the booth as if it were hers to grant—because it was. Her presence filled the narrow space, drowning out the brass thrum of the jukebox, the laughter of smugglers, the perfume-thick air. When he leaned back, she leaned forward, her chin resting lightly upon a gloved hand, violet eyes half-hooded and fixed on him with a weight that pressed harder than a blade at the throat.

The mask's porcelain curve caught the light, smooth and expressionless, but her lips beneath it parted ever so slightly, as though savoring the words he had just spoken. She let silence linger. Let him hear the beat of his own heart against his ribs, the uncertain patience of her stillness.

At last, she lifted her glass. The wine—dark, rich, untouched until now—kissed her lips. She drank slowly, deliberately, as though she were tasting something rarer than alcohol, as though every second he waited was part of her game. When she set the glass down again, her fingers lingered on the stem, caressing it idly.

Her voice, when it came, was low, smooth, and threaded with the softness of silk stretched taut.

"Names," she said, each syllable languid, "are for those who need to be remembered. For debts. For graves." A pause, long enough for the weight of her words to settle. "Do you need me to be remembered?"

She tilted her head, just so, the loose strand of hair by her cheek catching the glow of neon. The robe slipped further down her shoulder, exposing the hard glint of violet-threaded obsidian beneath. A secret shown, but not revealed. The kind of intimacy that was more dangerous than flesh.

Her gaze swept him, slow, deliberate, a caress without contact. She let him feel it—measured, appraising, stripping him bare with no more effort than a breath. Then, a faint smile curved her mouth, predatory and knowing.

"You offer drinks, flattery, charm." Her tone lingered on the last word, savoring it like a drop of honey. "Do you always pay with things that cost you nothing?"

She leaned back now, mirroring his posture but with the languid elegance of someone who owned the air between them. One gloved finger tapped the table once, a soft command, before sliding in a slow line toward him—never touching, only promising.

"If I wanted fire," she murmured, "this club would be ash. If I wanted blood, it would already be dripping from your lips." Her smile grew, licentious, indulgent. "But perhaps I want something else."

The glass turned in her hand once more, catching the glow of the room in fractured reds. She didn't drink. She let the pause swell until it was unbearable, then let her gaze lock with his, violet neon burning against the cool shadows of the lounge.

"Tell me," she said, soft as velvet, sharp as a knife. "What do you think I want?"

The game, after all, had only just begun.

 

[Calyx Sundrift]

His eyes never left the woman he shared the booth with. She owned the space. Deliberately leaning in as he leaned back. Ruling over him with silence, choosing when and if he'd get answers.

Finally, she spoke. Sweet like honey. Sophisticated and regal. Yet there was an edge that promised danger upon interruption. The threat in her words was subtle too.

Calyx, mouth set in a thin, tense line, choosing not to respond.

Her robe had slipped past the shoulder - on purpose, he imagined. It drew his attention. It have everything of straightforward seduction, were it not armour that she exposed. Calyx found himself holding his breath.

Then he spoke. "I suppose I must be that hollow." He swung an arm in a lazy gesture to the bar and stage beyond it. "To value this."

He traced her finger warily as she slowly draped it closer. It took effort to maintain his casual posture. She made another veiled threat. No- a statement. Reaffirming what he already knew. The bar stood only because she desired it so. And there was nothing he could do to stop her.

“I know,” he whispered, the concern in his voice betraying him.

And then, for the first time, he met her gaze fully. His blue stare against her burning violet.

He leaned forward, intruding into the space she had claimed. Not resisting her game. But joining it.

The same game he had played so many times before.

“Y'know, people have always intrigued me,” he said, voice casual but eyes sharp. “Where they come from. What made them. What hard choices shaped them.” He hoped to see a flicker of amusement. Maybe a smile. “I’ve tried to read people for years. Accents, especially, they tell stories. History. Convictions. I get it wrong sometimes.” He pointed at her. “But yours… yours is regal. And indistinct. You don’t talk with me. You talk to me. Like a being without equal.”

He folded his arms. Let the silence breathe.

“And your presence in the Force…” He didn’t hide it. He wasn’t going to pretend not to know. “You’re no mere dark side adept.” A pause. “I imagine you must be Sith.”

The word landed hard.

He took a breath.

Sith.

The Masters used to whisper stories about them when he was a youngling. So far, none had proven false.

“And Sith seek power. Secrets. Dominion.” So why here? Why come to a gutter bar, where nothing had value?

Unless-

"You're seeking me."

His heart slammed against his ribs. Fear pooled in his stomach like cold metal. Would she drag him back to the mines? Break him for her amusement? With a Sith, with her, he couldn’t rule it out.

"Well-" He forced air into his lungs, steadying himself. Fear was a vice. Defiance a blade. He reached for the blade. "I will not kiss your feet, my Lady." Did he even have leverage? Any token to bargain with, any card to play that wasn’t already in her hand?

There was one thing. The desire. The fragility. The part of himself he kept hidden, locked away.

Perhaps this was the only chance he’d ever have, to speak to someone who knew and hadn’t yet tried to kill him.

"Not without answers." He hesitated. The words came rough, pulled from someplace deeper than pride. "I need to know." His voice fell to a whisper, the question heavy as a confession. "Why does it come so easily, the Dark Side?"

Darth Virelia

 

[Darth Virelia]

"To be, or not to be."

Tags - Calyx Sundrift

Virelia regarded him as though the question had been drawn from his very blood, not his lips. The mask hid her expression, but her stillness carried weight—the kind of silence that signaled thought, not mockery. When she spoke, it was softer than before, the silk of her tone drawn taut with sincerity.

"Easily?" she repeated, the word tasting strange, as though she rolled it across her tongue before letting it fall between them. "No. Nothing worth wielding comes easily, not even darkness."

Her hand shifted, the slow, sinuous motion of a serpent uncoiling. She let her gloved fingers drift near his wrist, not touching, merely grazing the air above it. The warmth of her presence filled the gap—an unseen caress, neither invitation nor denial, only dominance wrapped in curiosity.

"For most," she murmured, "the Dark Side feels like release. They stumble upon it when rage becomes unbearable, when grief breaks the ribs apart and something hungry spills out. It feels like breathing after drowning. Like power without permission." She tilted her head, violet eyes burning steady through the haze of light. "And so they mistake it for freedom."

Her voice darkened, quiet but resonant. "But the Dark is not free. It feeds, yes—but it also feeds upon. It gives ecstasy, and in the same breath, demands devotion. For some, that becomes faith. For others…" She paused, a ghost of a smile curving her lips. "It becomes addiction."

The faintest sigh left her as she leaned forward, elbows resting on the table, the robe parting just enough to reveal the sleek black of her armor beneath, etched in fine violet veins of energy. "I am not like them," she said simply. "I do not worship it. I do not beg it for strength. I use it because I must."

Her fingers finally touched the back of his hand, cool through the glove but pulsing faintly with something alive—like static before a storm. "If I were to sever myself from it," she whispered, "my body would wither, my mind collapse into silence. The Dark sustains me as marrow sustains bone. It is not a servant, nor a god. It is a current, and I am the vessel that holds it together."

Her eyes softened—not in kindness, but in something perilously close to understanding. "Perhaps that is why it comes easily to you, too. Not because you are weak. But because the current already knows the shape of your heart."

She withdrew her hand, slow and deliberate, the absence of touch somehow heavier than the contact had been. "The Light tells its followers to empty themselves. To surrender." Her smile returned, faint and cutting. "The Dark demands the opposite. It wants you full—of fear, desire, memory, hunger. It wants you to know yourself completely. It rewards those who refuse to kneel."

A pause.

"Tell me," she said, her voice a whisper barely audible over the bar's hum, "which is easier? To deny what you are, or to embrace it?"

The question lingered, tender and venomous both, as she sat back in her throne of cracked leather, the scent of ozone faint in the air between them.

 

[Calyx Sundrift]

Calyx listened.

He’d encountered Dark Side practitioners before, but never had they come this close. Close enough to touch. Never had they shared knowledge. Never had they been open.

He caught himself staring at her hand as it hovered just above his. A subtle gesture, but somehow more intimate than a kiss. She had just said it. The Dark Side is not free. And he understood. On some level, he always had. Coming closer to this woman, closer to what she represented, would cost him something. Something precious, maybe even final.

He didn’t know what it was yet, only that he wasn’t sure he could afford to pay it.

"An addiction..." he echoed, the word tasting bitter in his mouth. There was truth in it. That much had been clear from the beginning. It felt like power without price at first. No guilt. No moral compromise. Just raw strength surging through his body. The backlash came only when his limits were breached. Feeble consequences for the high it gave him.

And wasn’t that always the danger?

She explained how she was different. That the Dark Side hadn’t claimed her. That it served her. Calyx had heard the Sith say something similar, though with more arrogance and less clarity. Power through control. Dominate or be dominated.

But she didn’t posture. She didn’t preach. She spoke as if the Force were just a tool. As if it were blunt, cold, and obedient. No morality. No will of its own.

It was that calm certainty that unsettled him most.

Then she turned the conversation to him. To the Dark side’s awareness of him. That it knew his heart already.

That stuck.

Only then did he realize her hand had withdrawn. That she had touched him. Somehow, he hadn’t noticed. Calyx clenched his fingers into a fist, then stretched them out, as if to prove to himself that it had happened. That it was real.

Then came her question, so casual, but piercing in its implication.

"To deny what I am." A murderer. A thief. A vagrant. A slave. An exile. Each label carved into him over time, each one earned or imposed. They clung to him like old scars. Some were healed, most not.

He didn’t flinch when he said it. There was no point pretending anymore.

"Is that what you came to offer?" he asked, shifting closer to her in the booth. He ignored the way her presence made his skin tense, like the pressure change before a storm. "Ecstasy... and in the same breath, devotion, as you so nicely put it?"

He should feel disgust. Fear. Revulsion at the prospect of surrendering to something larger than himself again. He'd been a tool once. For masters and men alike. Causes too, like rebellion and revolution. He'd bled for people who didn’t know his name, and suffered under those who claimed to free him.

Why, then, was he still listening?

Why did part of him wonder if she could give him purpose again?

The idea of something bigger than survival had once driven him. Now, he lived day to day, clinging to his life of pleasures like a shield. But what had that identity bought him, truly?

His jaw clenched as the silence dragged. He knew what she was doing. Letting the idea settle. Letting him do the work. Temptation didn’t always come with fire and fury. Sometimes, it came with silence and suggestion.

He looked at her again. She seemed so composed, so sure.

"Why expect me to kneel when the Dark Side rewards those who don’t?"

And yet, what if kneeling wasn’t surrender?

What if it was transformation?

He hated that he was even asking the question.

Darth Virelia

 

[Darth Virelia]

"To be, or not to be."

Tags - Calyx Sundrift

Virelia's smile bloomed like a slow knife, cutting through the dim with quiet delight—not in mockery, but in recognition. His words were raw, and she treated them as such. Reverently. As though confession were the purest language of all.

Her gaze slid down to his clenched fist, then lingered there, patient, before returning to his eyes. The violet in her irises seemed alive now, threads of light pulsing faintly like veins beneath glass. Her hand drifted once more, fingers brushing his wrist in a touch that was light, deliberate—permission sought and denied in the same motion. When she spoke, her tone had changed again—no longer the queen's command nor the temptress' purr, but something closer to truth, made dangerous only by how gently she wielded it.

"The Dark Side asks for recognition. It wants you to see what you are beneath all the scaffolding you built to survive. The masks. The names. The excuses." A faint smile. "It wants the marrow, not the armor."

She leaned closer, enough that the faintest breath of her voice grazed his skin. "You think of it as surrender because you've only ever known masters who demanded it. But the Dark is not a master. It is an echo. It doesn't care if you kneel or stand, only that you see yourself clearly."

Virelia let the pause linger, her eyes flicking over his face, studying the tension carved there. "Devotion is not the act of kneeling—it is the act of choosing who or what is worthy of your fire. Your pain. Your hunger. The Dark rewards that choice because it understands how rare it is."

Her thumb traced an invisible line across the table's edge, the gesture idle but hypnotic. "You ask what I came to offer." Her lips curved again, half smile, half secret. "A mirror, perhaps. The kind that does not lie. I could strip away the things you pretend not to be afraid of. The guilt you carry for surviving when others didn't. The softness you call weakness. All of it. Until what remains is not something you worship…"

She leaned in, so close now that her words brushed against him like the edge of a blade hidden in silk. "…but something you are."

The air between them grew heavy, a silence electric and alive.

"I do not recruit," she whispered, honest and soft. "I do not save. I find those who have already begun to fall and show them how to land on their feet."

Her gloved hand withdrew again, slowly, deliberately, leaving the faintest warmth behind. "Kneel, stand, walk away—it changes nothing. The Dark will follow you regardless. It is patient. It knows your scent now."

Her gaze locked on his, a quiet, dangerous intimacy in every word that followed.

"The only question left," her voice barely above a breath, "is whether you will spend the rest of your life running from the truth—or learning to use it."

 

[Calyx Sundrift]

The Dark Side asks for recognition? Reflection?

Calyx's jaw clenched, his eyes narrowing as he put up a wall, refusing to show any emotion. If there truly was a cold-blooded killer buried beneath the surface, he would take that truth to the grave. His lips pressed into a hard line, chin lifting in quiet defiance, his expression carved from stone. "And if who I want to be is different from the person buried underneath?" The Dark Side wanted the marrow? Well he'd toss it a Bantha's spine, let it gnaw on that.

But then came the arguments that were harder to refute. The Dark Side wasn't complete surrender. And even the Sith didn't speak of devotion the way zealots did. That much, he had to concede. He'd felt fleeting devotion once, to the Hidden Path. To Rebels who had splintered from the Alliance to resist the Empire's tyranny. And yet now, they returned to the Jedi. The Jedi, who had failed repeatedly as peacekeepers, as guides. But was oppression any better? No Sith Empire had endured. No Imperial territory had truly prospered. So what did that leave? He'd shifted closer to her on purpose when he'd voiced his doubts. And now, as she moved intoxicatingly close, he realized that it worked both ways. Fine. Two could play that game. Brave or foolish, he chose the subtle attack.

Body language, he'd learned, was best used to command a room. To put others off balance. To provoke discomfort. But he didn't know if that would work on a Sith. Or if he'd survive trying. "I believe that the guilt is what separates me from mindless beasts." Calyx leaned back, arm draped over the booth's edge behind her, inviting her into his space. "Or is that what I'm meant to see in the mirror? A creature stripped of humanity?" And yet, somehow, even surrounded by him - she still owned the booth.

Expression unreadable, he glanced down. Her hand again resting atop his. Warmer than touch had any right to be. It was because, despite the defiance, despite the disgust he held for the Sith and their methods, he found himself trusting her. Because deep down… she was right. He hadn't mastered the Dark Side. It had mastered him. And she was offering what he needed the most. Help and guidance. Yet all he did was throw up walls in return. Maybe dealing with her required the ways of Kessel. You didn't need to take everything that was offered. Just what you needed. And leave the rest behind.

"I believed in the Jedi. Always." His voice dropped, almost reverent. "Their ideals. Their heroism. The Light… it was everything. Until I realized they were just sentients too." He looked away. "Since then, I've tried to forge my own way. Unshackled by their code and tenets. Their prohibitions." A mirthless smile tugged at his mouth. "Let's just say I've been selflessly offering my services in other ways." He didn't laugh. Just snorted. "To answer your question, no. I won't run from this path anymore. If the Dark Side lies ahead, I need to overcome it." He hesitated the length of a heartbeat. "So please…" His voice was quieter now. "Show me how to land on my feet." He thought for a moment, then added. "And what you require of me in exchange."

Darth Virelia

 

[Darth Virelia]

"To be, or not to be."

Tags - Calyx Sundrift

Virelia's laugh was soft—low, breathy, and impossibly warm. It carried no mockery, no cruelty. Only a kind of indulgent approval, the sound one makes when a pupil finally asks the right question. Her gaze lingered on him for a long moment, violet light catching the curve of her lips as she leaned in, close enough that the scent of ozone and spice wrapped around him like heat.

"Good," she murmured, her voice velvet-dark. "At last, you speak like one who understands the weight of asking."

"You ask what I require," she continued, tone shifting to something quieter, more intimate. "Service, yes. But not the kind you've known. Not mindless obedience. I would have your eyes open, your blade steady, and your allegiance measured not in worship, but in understanding."

Her gaze turned distant for a moment, violet eyes unfocusing as though seeing far beyond the walls of the lounge. "The galaxy is fractured—empires eating their own dead, Jedi preaching peace while strangling truth, Sith burning themselves in the name of passion they cannot control. I have gathered those who refuse that cycle. The broken, the exiled, the dangerous thinkers. We are not Jedi. We are not Sith."

Her attention returned to him, sharp and deliberate. "We are the Dark Court."

The words seemed to carry a weight all their own, more invocation than name. "A dominion built not on fear or faith, but inevitability. A secretive order, yes, but each chain forged by choice. Each serving not because they must, but because they will. I rule as Dark Queen because I have the will to do so. And those who follow me…" She smiled faintly, eyes lowering to his hand once more. "…learn to rule themselves first."

Her voice softened again, almost affectionate. "Serve me there, in my Court. Not as thrall or acolyte, but as something rarer—a creature who remembers his own name and yet chooses to stand among monsters."

Her hand rose, fingers brushing the air beside his jaw but not touching, as if marking the line between temptation and promise. "That will be your exchange, Calyx Sundrift. Your service. Your recognition."

She leaned forward until her breath ghosted against his ear, her final words barely more than a whisper.

"Help me build a order—and in return, I will teach you how to stand upon the ashes of the old."