Ned POV
By the twelfth year, Varis had become a fear the Sith whispered to each other when they thought my name too large for useful conversation.
The Red King was distant. Mythic. A storm over maps.
Reaper was personal.
Reaper knew the school where your master trained. Reaper knew which blood oath your grandmother broke. Reaper knew the servant entrance beneath your dueling hall, the false tomb where your family hid its cowards, the prayer you spoke before sleep when fear made you young again.
Four blood houses united to kill him.
They should have sent more.
The hunt crossed three moons and one protector-world ruled by Lord Aramet, a Sith whose sin was not incompetence. He fed his people. Protected them. Kept pirates off his routes. Punished cruelty when it wasted labor. His cities were orderly. His children educated. His slaves had winter stores.
That made him harder to kill cleanly.
"He is still Sith," Varis said.
"That is not an argument."
"It used to be."
"We are past used to be."
Aramet did not hide behind his people. He stood before them in bronze armor under a green sky and called me replacement.
"You are not peace," he said across the field. "You are a stronger hunger."
My soldiers heard.
His citizens heard.
Worst of all, I heard.
We broke his allied blood houses first. Varis led that work. He moved through their moons like a sentence. Lana and Sorel followed with acolyte units now strong enough to frighten old masters. They cut communications, turned apprentices, exposed hidden heirs, and forced private fears into public rooms.
On the second moon, Varis took a Sith matriarch alive.
"Tell them," he said.
She refused.
He named the child she had hidden from succession. Named the poison in her chapel wine. Named the slave revolt she had begged a rival to suppress. Her pride collapsed before her body did.
That was Varis's gift.
He knew where shame lived.
When we reached Aramet's capital, the people did not welcome us. They stood behind their lord and wept before battle began.
The duel happened at the city gate.
Aramet was powerful. Let no later Seresh record make him small to flatter me. His blade was gold-white. His Force control steady, old, disciplined by real responsibility. He struck my armor hard enough to crack the left shoulder plate and pushed me back three steps in front of both armies.
My soldiers gasped.
A god should not stumble.
Good.
People should see gods bleed before worship becomes too easy.
We fought close. His style was defensive, civic, almost architectural. Every retreat pulled me away from the gate. Every counter forced me toward lines where my own soldiers could be endangered. He fought like a man protecting a city, and for several exchanges I hated him for being worthy of his people's grief.
White State came over me.
Breath. Blade. Force. Body.
No rage.
No pity driving the hand.
I broke his guard by cutting not at him, but at the rhythm he used to protect others. A low feint toward the gate. His blade dipped to cover. I stepped inside, struck his wrist with the pommel, turned, and drove my knee into his breastplate. Armor rang. He fell to one knee.
I could have killed him.
Varis did.
Not theft. Necessity, perhaps. Or mercy for me. Or the first open sign that Reaper had become more than title.
His blade flashed.
Aramet's head fell before his people.
The city did not cheer.
Varis lifted the head by its hair and spoke to the blood houses watching through hidden channels.
"Your protector is gone. Your shame remains. Come be harvested."
That night, I found him alone washing blood from his hands.
"You wanted to kill him," I said.
"No."
"Then why?"
Varis looked at me through the water's reflection. "Because you wanted not to."
I should have been grateful.
Instead, I understood that he was becoming a doctrine beside mine. A necessary one. A terrible one.
Outside, Aramet's people knelt and some cursed my name while doing it.
They were right to do both.
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