This week’s Maul episodes reminded me of the intro to chapter 9 of Queens Peril. When I listened to this on audiobook years ago, this was when I realized Maul is not all evil. It was a reminder that there is a lot going on underneath the anger. He is a heartbreaking character.
“The apprentice sat in the dark waiting for his masters call. He’d lingered in the shadows for years now. Ever since he had been chosen and it was starting to grate on his nerves. He knew that was intentional. It made him angry to wait. To be pushed aside while his master manipulated the galaxy without him. It made him feel unwanted. And worse, unneeded. And of course, that had made him angry too. Maul had mastered anger a long time ago. He’d wrestled with it in the deep caves of Dathomir as a child and he’d wrestled so loudly that it had drawn his master’s attention. Most would have let the anger burn them up. Most would have flared out in glorious rage, taking untold numbers with them into the blackness of the void. But not Maul. Maul was made for better things. And his anger was his fuel. He was still working on hatred. There was just so many things to hate. He hated the way the fog on Dathomir had clouded his vision and made the witches stronger. He hated the way he had been cast aside as a male child, until some off-worlder saw his use. He hated that same off-worlder for training him so astutely through such pain and suffering. And then not letting him lose to wreck the same upon the galaxy. Most of all he hated the Jedi. They hadn’t come for him. He didn’t know if they had sensed him and found him unworthy. Or if in his untrained state he hadn’t been worth their time. But it didn’t matter. They had ignored him. Passed him over for some unknown reason. And even though he had been better served by their neglect, he was more powerful with his anger than he could have been without it. He counted the days until he could make them pay.
The pieces of his lightsaber hovered in the air in front of him. Separated from the wholeness while he tinkered with the alignment for the hundredth time. The lightsaber was death. This too was something he had been forced to grapple for. Every part of it was stolen. And every part of it was irrevocably his. Paid for in blood and pain. Only some of which had been his own. He focused, calling on the well of darkness inside him. The part that had scared the younger witches and now delighted his master so much. With the ease of practice, he pulled the saber together. The parts aligning as easily as everything else in his life had not. When it was completed, he stretched out a hand, pressed the button and lost himself in the hum. If asked, maul would say he feared nothing. He was wrong.”💔
From Queens Peril, written by E.K. Johnston.
