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Years of training under Master Daki did not prepare Devon for Maul’s fury.
It doesn't matter that she has the rage to match. The spars, the duels — they’ve become repetitive and exhausting. She feels like a loth wolf in a cage, clawing through its bars, hungry for a kill. She knows Maul can sense it: she’s lost her patience more than once, which he’s always corrected with sharp words. She doesn’t know why he continues to deny her the thrill of battle, to slake her thirst for vengeance.
He’s refused to take her to any excursions in a week. Instead, she’s endured countless rigorous exercises. She hears their lightsabers buzz and clash like tinnitus — she sees strobes of crimson whenever she closes her eyes.
It’s where she finds herself now, blade against his, although she wishes her mind has conjured this scene, too.
He pushes closer until they are eye-to-eye, face twisting into a scowl as he seethes. “Focus.”
She shouts and leaps overhead, planning to sweep his legs out when she lands. He kicks her midair. It knocks the air from her lungs and she launches back like a skipping stone. She wrestles to catch her breath. He may have bruised her ribs, again.
She clenches her fists.
Maul steps closer, although she makes no move to acknowledge him. Her lightsaber rattles when it hits the ground.
“Rise,” he snarls.
She stands sluggishly. Her grip steels around her saber when she ignites it, and she glares at Maul.
He folds his hands behind him. Her scorn does nothing. She recalls the train ride on Janix: her lightsaber poised defiantly at him, even though he helped her fight Marrok. Now, her saber illuminates him in a bloody radiance — not the azure it once was.
“Your thoughts lead you astray. Have you ever pondered why I have kept you here, away from battle?”
She refuses to answer. Her glower stays.
“It is because you,” he growls, “have become a liability. You lack precision. There is no meaning in your strikes. You bluntly chip at anything before you — ignorant to how dull your endeavors are.” His eyes narrow. “I will not have it.”
“You wanted me to become your apprentice,” she argues.
“That has not changed.” He straightens, closes his eyes and sighs, then ignites his weapon. “But it seems you need a reminder of why you are here.”
He readies himself, and Devon prepares for another intense round of combat.
“Recite to me the Jedi Code,” he orders — and strikes.
She blocks his attack, but its strength makes her stumble. The opening is lethal — he lunges. She scrambles back. His lightsaber blinds her for a second; its scalding heat fans her face. “There is no emotion; there is peace.” She spits the tenet and delivers a flurry of blows. He flicks them away. “There is no ignorance; there is knowledge.” All she sees is red. They spar together and she lets the Force guide her movements. The mantra, the trance — they’re almost comforting; but the memories have been tainted, the thoughts too agonizing to reminisce. “There is no passion; there is serenity.” She resents the familiarity. “There is no chaos; there is harmony!”
Another attack; another deflect; another defeat. Failure. It’s everything she’s known the past week. Each spar — each duel — each argument ends the same way. She knows — there is something she has yet to learn. Yet Maul refuses to show her what.
She bellows, lets the rage envelop her and strikes again. Their blades lock together. “There is no death; there is the Force!”
Meaningless — this is all meaningless. She projects her frustration at Maul, tries to smother him in it. He returns in kind. It feels like an ignition, an explosion which almost dominates her before it’s extinguished. He’s annoyed.
Maker, he’s pissed.
“The Jedi have taught you to bury your emotions. What has that served you?” His attacks are an onslaught, and Devon struggles to defend herself. “They denied ignorance, yet let corruption fester.” He is relentless. All she can do is retreat and parry, looking for a chance to escape. “Was there peace when your troops betrayed you?” he sneers. “Was there serenity when you were cast to the corners of civilization — was there harmony when you starved and begged in the streets, day after day?”
It’s rude, but she sees no other option: she attempts to kick him at the hip where she knows his circuits are vulnerable. It’s the last mistake she makes. He twists away — she reels forward — and his elbow punches her square in the back. The ache in her ribs flares. She yelps — and tumbles to her knees.
Another failure.
She squeezes her saber’s hilt until the grooves and buttons pinch her skin.
Maul pauses his assault. She must have sounded pitiful, but his hesitation is the advantage she needs. She turns on her heel and arcs her strike as she rises. He counters it, expression calm.
How much of it was precognition, rather than expectation?
“These doctrines still exist within you, my apprentice. Cast them aside.”
She shouts and hurls herself at him. Each strike is ferocious and he returns them in kind. Finally, it’s a fair fight.
“There is no peace,” he explains, “only passion. Everyone scrambles for strength — for power — but only the sharpest of wills survive this world; only the mighty prosper. It was a truth your master” — Devon stiffens — “was blind to see.”
Her attacks intensify. Daki — why did he mention Daki? Daki is dead. She’s severed the path to him. There is nothing to dwell — nothing to do to change it. Maul is malicious, but he has never done things to spite her.
“You have realized this.” His voice lilts, although Devon recognizes the tone for what it is: catching more flies with honey. “You chose the righteous path.”
He swings his blade and it crashes against hers with a flare, but he doesn’t yield. Instead, he pushes his weight onto her, until the pressure makes her cower. The scarlet glow gives his irises a menacing gleam. This close, she can even count each vein in his bloodshot eyes.
He hisses his next words, discarding all tenderness: “If only your master lived to see it.”
Her walls crack. Every memory, every thought she’s had of Daki — the Jedi Order, the toppled Republic — which she’s stifled and buried floods her mind. The current roars, but the one that tears through her throat is thunderous. Her lightsaber’s thrum echoes alongside her scream as she channels all the grief and sorrow into a single blow.
Maul’s lightsaber clatters to the ground.
She collapses, too, and claws her hands into the surface beneath her. Her tears fall next. Despite how still she holds herself, how tight she clenches her fists, her body trembles. She sobs. At first restrained, until her walls shatter and she wails, keens like the suffering is new, like there’s salt in her wound. She struggles to breathe or see anything—
Except for a smidge of black. There is a hand on her shoulder.
“You must embrace the pain,” Maul whispers. This time his words aren’t a honeyed snare: the comfort is earnest, which only makes her cry harder. “There must be meaning. There must be a reason: a stone we use to hone our edge.”
His hand never leaves her side while she weeps. When her vision clears, she sees her tears and snot have wet the ground. She snivels and wipes her nose.
“This journey is new to you and cannot be rushed.” Although her sobs have tapered, tears still well in her eyes. He squeezes her shoulder. “Have patience, Devon. Then, you will learn — then, we will have our revenge.”
She takes time to even her breaths and muster the courage to look at him. She expects him to scowl, to have the anger she sensed not long ago. Instead, concern replaces it. The foreign expression disarms her.
It fades before she can indulge in it. He scrutinizes her, and she feels small under his gaze — but she holds it.
He rises and offers his hand. “You are ready.”
She takes it.