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~~Chapter 7: Welcome to Dathomir~~

Read live one chapter ahead on Ao3! Link at the bottom. This is the sequel to Desertification, so read that first if you're new to the series. Updates Tuesdays! Comment to be added to tag list. :3

Maul sits hunched over a tome from Mother Talzin’s library, breathing the scent of dust and old leather as words swim in front of his eyes. On the opposite page, a painting of two witches blurs as an oil-slick fractal blooms across his tired vision. The witches dance beneath inconsistent, wriggling lines that morph slowly into the impression of a many-legged arthropod.

The sith presses the heels of his hands to his failing eyes, growling faintly as he demands they continue to work.

For over a month he has not slept more than two hours at a stretch. His legs tingle, ache, and go numb in turns. Full supply crates stand empty, depleted as he burns through calories double-time. Regardless, hunger claws at his belly as he reads. As ever, he turns to the force, fueling himself with rage as he searches for some record of what could be hunting him. A clue, a tale, a rumor, a scrap.

The comm on his desk chirps with a new message. He ignores it. Attending meetings on holocall is a waste of time and risks embarrassing collapses, so Vos is contacting him at random hours with reports he barely retains. Planning his next move, planning anything, is an exercise in wrangling concentration for long enough to come to a point. Meals and habits are interrupted. Thoughts are interrupted. Everything is interrupted.

Clinging threads hunt him through the force, day and night.

Still, progress has been made, inch by miserable inch. The nature of his enemy continues to elude him, but his research has not been entirely fruitless. The nightsisters’ unique mastery of the force yet survives in their writings, and Maul has found himself improving very quickly at two things: the obfuscation of his force presence, and the use of a nightmagick cantrip which makes the user harder to perceive. Neither work as well as the sanctum’s wards, but together they have stymied his enemies’ attempts to hook their spell into his bones.

With two other practitioners, he would have been able to perform the same mistwalking ritual the sisters once used for assassinations. If only securing the help of other witches was not unfeasible in the wake of Sidious' massacre. If only the temple’s library held some tale of this strange affliction. If only its ghosts responded to his presence as though to a witch rather than a mere nightbrother.

If only, if only, if only.

Maul digs claws further between his horns and growls in disgust at his own thoughts. Pointless, pathetic speculation in the face of his failure to find answers.

Or more accurately, his failure to go get answers. The knowledge he seeks is somewhere out there, away from Dathomir.

His ability to withstand the attacks without sheltering in the sanctum is growing, but it remains an inevitability that without the wards’ aid he will, eventually, be overcome. Weeks, a month… perhaps two.

The hunters will persist— chasing him from sleep, interrupting his plans, dogging his every step. He can draw on the dark side to sustain his body beyond exhaustion, will do so without hesitation, but resisting the threads’ pull requires concentration. Closing his teeth on the power of the dark side is to be bitten and held in turn, to lose himself in its churning depths. Eventually his mind will unravel, drawn out on a riptide. In that one moment he would lapse, and the threads would have him.

He cannot risk leaving Dathomir without direction.

With no other options immediately available to him, Maul is left waiting on the mercy of Dryden Vos, stewing in the certainty that the wretched man is going to savor each and every moment of this miserable showcase like another one of his priceless Nubian wines.

Vos at least arrives swiftly after being summoned, sauntering down the ramp from First Light wearing incongruous white silk belted at the waist and a large silver pendant cut into the unmistakable crest of the Crimson Dawn. An AL-T model astromech trundles behind him, bearing a case upon the serving tray installed in place of its dome.

The near-human looks around as he descends, pale eyes greedily eating up his first look at the temple’s facade. But even his obsession with force nexus -of which Dathomir is a unique example- and ancient history -which the entire complex is a monument to- do not distract the man from giving Maul an unwelcome and thorough once over.

He knows how he looks. The inspection is unnecessary.

“My lord.”

White teeth flash in a honeyed smile and Vos bows smoothly at the waist, hand-to-heart with the other arm swept out to the side. It shows off a half cape lined in shimmering ivory, and the custom petar knives sheathed at his hip.

Maul gives him a narrow look.

The crime lord’s expression turns toward affected concern as he straightens.

“My, what circumstances the galaxy brings us.” The man’s outstretched hand comes to rest on Maul’s upper arm, steel blue eyes flickering down and up a second time.

Irritation burns in the sith’s chest.

“You look…“ Vos dithers long enough to bite a knuckle, then shrugs expansively, frowning. “Well, terrible, honestly. Are you eating?”

Fingers alight on Maul’s collarbone, then catch under his jaw, daring to tilt his chin up as Vos makes a show of examining his face with light, doting touches, his gaze far too sharp. “... Sleeping?”

Snarling, Maul grabs the man’s wrist and squeezes until he feels bones grind.

The scrutiny ends. Vos’ face goes flat as he meets the sith’s glare, exaggerated expressions and loose movements exchanged for focused stillness in a second. Good. Maul has little interest in playing at the moment.

Dryden’s markings flush a shade darker as he leans closer, brows lifting. His voice drops into a murmur despite their lack of an audience. Unless one counted the droid. “Tell me there’s been some good news since last we spoke?”

There is none, of course. Maul closes half the distance to Vos’ darkening face and lets his voice lower to a tense drawl.

“What have you brought me?” he asks slowly.

A muscle in Dryden’s cheek tics at the question, irritation and impatience swirling in his weak force presence. A blink, and it is all shuffled from view as the man disengages, showing his teeth in a smile. Maul does not so much as blink, but he does release fragile wristbones from his crushing grip.

Vos turns without a word to the gleaming white and gold astromech droid, finally letting go of Maul’s arm, and keys open the case it is holding. The seal breaks with a hiss, and he withdraws two books, flimsiplast and bound. One is simple and blue, the other is covered in what looks like nautolan skin.

"My lord, I am afraid that these are the only relevant texts in my immediate collection… but as promised I have assets hunting through a more robust selection for further options."

Maul accepts the meager offering and gives the books a cursory examination, ready to investigate any line of inquiry -no matter how thin- that might get him some fucking sleep.

Vos lingers at his side, but physically leans toward the carved redstone of the temple behind him. Manicured fingers idly trace the jagged markings at his throat. The lines begin to flush again, from pale pink to darker mauve.

It makes the desired compensation for this man’s help -hand delivered- abundantly clear.

"A start," Maul comments about the books, turning for the entrance. "Follow. We shall discuss these, and what else you might offer me, over tea."

"I would kill for some tea. Honestly, what a day," says the blonde, moving to walk with him, astromech in tow. A historian’s gaze explores the fallen remains of titanic Paecian architecture, the broken artistry laying scattered on either side of the entry it once guarded.

"Mnh," the sith replies. They both know it is not about tea.

Maul leads them through the central cavern and into a series of winding corridors cut into the stone beyond, all the way to the northern edge of the mountain.

The cramped tunnels open to a series of gouges in the cliff side. It looks like something unreasonably large had taken a swipe out of the rock, or that the mountain had withstood a glancing volley from a ship’s laser cannons long ago. It is here, in a bid to escape the reek of tibanna soot and decaying battle droids, that Maul has made his home. For however many years it had been just a peculiar set of overlooks. Now, the view of the northern swamp across the horizon remains, but the elements are held back by transparisteel.

He takes Vos directly into the open cavern that is his living room, a broad circular depression in its middle. The walls here are a work in progress, only partially smoothed. What was once a scattering of boulders are now various pieces of furniture arranged around a magnificent, man-sized hearth where burns a woodless green ichor fire. These were his idle projects, his distractions, carved when Maul wanted to think while his hands were kept busy.

The other man does not hide his curiosity any longer, although his face is a study in polite, inscrutable interest. His eyes linger most on Maul's decor. Cloth hangings and useful pottery he had recovered from the abandoned nightbrother village. Tapestries of fine weave from the nightsister's dwellings. A growing collection of trinkets gathered during his travels, and gifts from various sources, mostly given in tribute to Crimson Dawn and diverted his way by Vos.

Or perhaps it was Vos’ secretary who thought of him, given how the man in question pauses to examine a verne spine, coiled and bejeweled, like he had never seen it before. Some things are his own additions, lifted from sith temples or taken as trophies after an assassination.

The result is art both fine and rustic. Treasures and trinkets that range from sentimental to priceless. Hints of his tastes from living on Coruscant for so long, set right alongside banners for dead Night Clan bloodlines.

Seeing the figurehead of the Dawn in the middle of it -all bespoke white shimmersilk and silver accents- is odd in a way he cannot begin to define.

Maul shakes off the useless feeling and gestures Vos toward the sitting area. The man heads down into it with a nod, gracefully taking a seat."Wait here," he orders evenly, "I will return."

He can feel it, again. The build up before the threads come.

Dryden collects a datapad from the droid and gets comfortable, looking entirely too agreeable. “As you wish, my lord.”

Maul withdraws to the kitchen, setting the books down on the rock that is going to, eventually, be a dinner table. The sith takes a moment to cross the room and add water to his battered kettle, flipping it on to heat. It fails to start. He flips the switch twice more before the mechanism hums to life. Then, he goes to sit down while it boils, hands clasped on the rough stone slab before him.

There, he waits for it…

The whisper of claws and gossamer string come searching, winding, looking for him-

w,

h,

e,

r,

e

?

Maul uses the little twist of will he had worked out which empowers the cantrip. The edges of his hands grow blurry, fingers becoming like claws of smoke. He reels in his energy, his self, his senses, until the average force user would tell you that he simply does not exist. Not a gap in the world -like a droid- nor a living thing.

Nothing there.

Still the threads wind around him, this cloying sensation of being petted and cherished and-

The kettle begins to scream.

The sith hisses. Hiding, hiding, hiding-

Finally it goes.

There is a shake to his limbs as the smokiness fades, but Maul regains his feet without pause. A meager flush of victory runs through him. The war wages on, but this latest battle has been won, and won more skillfully than before. Every centimeter of progress gives him the will to carve out another.

The afflicted nightbrother inhales deeply once upright, refocusing as the tremors settle.

Maul finishes making tea, then returns to the social call with a tray. He brings two steaming cups and a bowl of nuts, none of which should be harmful to a near-human. Probably.

"My lord, I have a question."

Maul sets his burden on the roughly cut caf table, and offers Vos a glazed black mug, detailed with poisonous flowers.

The man takes it delicately, blue gaze intent on Maul’s face. The sith meets that look, recognizing hunger in any form it takes.

"What is it?" he asks, getting his own drink and drifting away to take a seat on a distant section of couch.

With a slow, delighted grin beginning to stretch his features, Dryden points at a wall hanging made of embossed metallic slats that sits by the door. "That, unless I am entirely mistaken, is over seventeen thousand years old. At minimum. A mirialan poem, from their third 'iron renaissance'?"

A glimmer of collector's lust sparkles in Vos' eyes. Hungry indeed, for history it seems. "An accurate assessment. It is."

The other man rises, drink in hand as he approaches the metal scroll, beginning to recite its words in their original language.

"As an imperfect actor on this stage,

Who with fear is put beside their part

Or some fierce thing replete with rage,

Whose strength's abundance outdoes them

So I, in my fear, forget to say

The perfect ceremony of love's rite

And in this way my own strength decays"

Vos holds himself like he is trying desperately not to touch the thing. "What a little treasure you have here. The speaker… overcome by their own depth of emotion… they fail to express themselves to their love, and their confidence is then lost? Perhaps their position as a suitor entirely?"

Maul hums, "I would argue it is their self control, not the depth of their passion, that leads to their failure, whichever it might be."

The crime lord sighs, and takes a drink of his tea, lingering there. "Wonderful. If you have other such pieces I would be so interested in seeing them."

Maul considers it a moment. Letting Vos loose among his collection of artifacts has its drawbacks, but it would serve as plentiful distraction. The sith stands, takes a long pull on his own drink, then abandons the rest in favor of a handful of nuts. "Follow."

"Don’t mind if I do," Vos smiles, joining Maul as he leads the way down a set of stairs to the level below.

He brings them down to his treasury amid the unfinished stone walls, and gestures at the clutter. At the sea of clutter.

Vos’ takes an audible breath, lets it out in a little sigh and a barely-there huff of… something unclear. His faint force signature roils with many emotions at once, all of them intent.

Those jagged markings are going off again, flushing bloody as he starts forward into the room.

Maul puts up a hand to stop him, and the man walks right into it. Blue eyes- their whites gone pink in a pale mirror of a sith’s stare- snap sharply to his face, openly hostile for the barest moment before a veneer of affected warmth slides back into place.

It is Maul’s turn to lean in.

"Be wary,” he lilts. Glaring down people a head taller than him is an art and he has perfected it. “A third of these items might kill you at a touch, and no few are… seductive in their draw."

Vos grins at him and dares to take Maul’s hand off his chest, bowing to kiss the knuckles. "You spoil me, my lord."

Maul thinks putting up with him is the greater benevolence, but keeps that to himself. "Mnh."

The blonde starts exploring with the caution of a man who specializes in the forgotten and forbidden. Maul is content to munch on nuts and leave him to it, watching only to ensure that Vos is not ensnared by something desperate to escape its prison; or a bauble meant to test a fully realized sith and not someone with a mere iota of force training.

It is almost peaceful until the threads come cresting back in a rush, syrupy strings and insubstantial claws. New. The syrupy quality is new. Maul folds under the onslaught, stumbling back into the doorframe with teeth bared.

It sticks, it clings, it wants -

s

e

k

i

n

g

«

Maul roars at the searching threads, shoving them all away, away! They peel off and slither back, trying to find their way in to bind him. There is no time for the cantrip, he holds these at bay with rage alone.

He comes back out of his internal world damp with sweat and panting, hunched down on his knees. Green mist leaks from his mouth and nose, and the air smells of burnt things.

Vos is standing before him, very still. "My lord, are you… well?” the other man asks, eyes bright and lips slightly parted as though witnessing something riveting.

Maul rises, chest vibrating as a growl of frustration pours out of him, at the threads and the softly-spoken question alike.

A blonde head tilts, birdlike. "Perhaps… you should rest? I could not feel that as you do, merely a faint, mm… vertigo? But it did look…” the man finally inhales and blinks, body language relaxing out of a predator’s stillness into something almost normal, “…rather exhausting to overcome."

Another lingering once-over and pale brows turn up in an expression that does not match any aspect of how Dryden Vos feels in the living force.

Maul grinds his teeth and stands to his full height, forcing his voice steady, "I will go review the texts you have brought. Do as you will."

He turns to go, and hears Vos follow at his back.

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