A Candle in the Dark

It was night. The wind rustled through the leaves of the trees bringing an extra chill to the air. It brought a shiver to a few members of the assembled group of beings who stood at the edge of the clearing of the forest. There they sat, waiting for a seemingly endless time. The sky was dark, yet the stars shone in the two score yellow eyes that waited, gazing upwards in swift anticipation. What they were awaiting was one thing that is best left unsaid for the moment. Rather, look at the state that they were in. The children, at the front, were all somewhat pasty, their skin, which should have been a light bronze was a sort of pasty gold. Their eyes were tired and their frames were plainly visible. The women, their skin should have been a darker bronze than the children's, but they too were off colour. But in their eyes was a gleam, it shone with a steady beat. That gleam was hope! One look in those eyes and it was clear to see that they were rising, they were climbing back up out of a pit of despair, returning from the brink of death. It does raise the question of who they were waiting for, but by now the answer should be obvious. They were waiting for the one who had been their hero, they were waiting for the return of a leader, a saviour. For the women present, they awaited their husband, for the children, their father.

Many years ago he had saved their world, he and his demigod partner. He had commanded the armies that had driven the Soulless Ones from their world, and then followed them till they were on their knees and begged for help. Until the traitorous outsiders had given assist. They had driven their people into the dirt and crushed them. Many starved and died, even some of his children. Most of his wives still remembered the anguished screams of rage and loss that had torn from his parched throat as he held the body of his youngest child and beseeched the gods to stop torturing him. Even the youngest of his children remembered the fiery oaths he had sworn to make the outsiders regret and grieve for what they had done. They had crippled the land, they had stripped it of all that was of worth! Brutally and ferociously they had been destroyed until they were forced to eat the bark off the trees to survive. Then had come the hardest day of all for them when a different group of off worlder's had come with a bargain. If he left his people would be saved. His family could remember the difficulty he had faced before he had left, sacrificing his own life for the sake of his people. Only one of his wives had realized at the time the intense need in him to keep fighting, to keep attacking, to keep from remembering the friend he had lost in the war. For four years he had been gone before he had returned in a blaze of glory. Then to have him stolen away once more as his ship was destroyed in fire and smoke, and his body robbed by outlanders who did not deserve to touch the sacred thing he had become in death, the torture was too much for his family.

But they had recently received hope. He was still alive. And so they waited for his inevitable return. For return he would, the most famous of his father's sons. Hero of the Kaleesh, head of his clan and warlord of his people, Qymaen jai Sheelal

Better known as General Grievous.