This Forgotten Sith From Legends Rivalled Palpatine's Power

Are You Familiar With This Sith Mistress?

By Culture SlatePublished 2 years ago • 5 min read

In Legends, the deaths of Darth Vader and of Emperor Palpatine effectively ended the line of the Sith, as it had been established by Sith Lord Darth Bane and his "Rule of Two". However, lurking in the shadows was a new and emergent Sith Lord (or Mistress) waiting through the galactic events that followed the end of the Empire to finally make her own mark on the galaxy, in some ways rivaling the powers of her master, Emperor Palpatine. Meet Shira Brie (aka Lady Lumiya).

Born on Coruscant (aka "Imperial Center") during the height of the Galactic Empire, Shira Elan Colla Brie was a force-sensitive female who started her rise to power as an Imperial agent and, later, as a Hand of Emperor Palpatine, much like Mara Jade. Darth Vader saw much potential in Brie and helped guide her advance through the Imperial ranks. In her first major assignment, she was given the task of infiltrating the Rebel Alliance and discrediting Luke Skywalker, following his destruction of the first Death Star. Luke is successfully ostracized for a time by the Rebels after firing on Brie's fighter, albeit for reasons that he believed, through his use of the Force, were justified at the time. The eventual discovery of Brie's true identity as an Imperial agent later vindicated Skywalker.

The event, however, left Brie near death and, like with Vader, she required some cybernetic reconstruction in order to survive. Shortly thereafter, she began training in the dark side of the Force under Vader under the assumed identity of Lumiya and became a hand to Emperor Palpatine. Lumiya traveled to the Sith world of Ziost and crafted her infamous lightwhip, a weapon she would become notorious for using. Vader and Palpatine perished aboard the second Death Star before she could return from Ziost.

Following the deaths of Vader and Emperor and the fall of the Galactic Empire, Lumiya took on an ex-Stormtrooper, Flint, as an apprentice and allied herself with a group of extra-galactic invaders known as the Nagai in her quest for vengeance against the Rebel Alliance and Luke Skywalker for the deaths of Vader and Palpatine. She was ultimately defeated by the New Republic, even though she managed to escape Luke's custody, but she vowed to continue her efforts against the New Republic. After losing another apprentice, former royal guardsman Carnor Jax joined her, but he betrayed her and was killed by another former guardsman, leaving her without an apprentice once again.

Eventually, she ended up taking residence on the asteroid dwelling of a former Sith Lord, Darth Vectivus, where she mastered the creation of dark side Force phantoms. She was also invited to join a new Sith Order on Korriban, The One Sith, led by Darth Krayt. However, the invasion by the Yuuzhan Vong delayed those plans, and she remained in the shadows, seeking to undermine the invaders in her own way. It was during this time that she met the Fosh ex-Jedi-turned-Sith Vergere, who was then serving the Yuuzhan Vong and completed her dark side training under Vergere. It was at this point that Lumiya and Vergere decided to attempt to turn Jacen Solo, son of Han and Leia, to the dark side. Together, they facilitated his capture by the Vong, where Vergere began his indoctrination into the Sith, although Jacen did not know Vergere's true intentions at the time.

More than a decade later, Lumiya re-emerged from the shadows to put her and the now-deceased Vergere's plans into motion to turn Jacen away from the Jedi and towards the Sith. At that time, political tensions were rising between the Galactic Alliance, the successor state to the New Republic, and Corellia. From the shadows, Lumiya helped escalate these tensions, eventually leading to the eruption of a new Galactic Civil War. Additionally, Lumiya managed to orchestrate events so that Jacen sought her out on her asteroid dwelling. It was during that first encounter that he took his first step towards the dark side, enticed by Lumiya into killing a fellow Jedi Knight, out of a misguided belief that he would be saving others by his actions. Lumiya continued to train Jacen in the dark side of the Force from the shadows, later culminating in him killing his aunt, Mara Jade-Skywalker in a brutal fight, and using her death as a sacrifice to fully cement his place as a Sith Lord.

During this time, Luke and Mara had become aware of Lumiya's reemergence and attempted to confront her on several occasions, failing to kill or capture her. Lumiya also allied herself with a fallen Twi'lek Jedi, Alema Rar, who had gone to the dark side during the Dark Nest Crisis, to cause more mayhem during the political upheaval of the new Galactic Civil War. Knowing that Luke would almost certainly suspect her and Alema of being responsible for Mara's death, Lumiya sought out a final confrontation with Luke, resulting in her defeat and death at his hands. Luke, through the efforts of his son, Ben, later learned that it was, in fact, Jacen, who was responsible for Mara's death, causing him to regret his actions in killing Lumiya out of a misguided sense of vengeance and keeping him from taking on the role of hunting down and killing Jacen.

Lumiya left behind a legacy that rivaled that of her masters, Vader and Palpatine, and was a lot like both of them in various ways. She was like Vader in terms of having to also rely on cybernetic life support systems and Palpatine, in terms of being able to influence people and orchestrate galactic events for her own nefarious purposes, mostly from the shadows. Her most enduring and unfortunate legacy may well be turning Jacen Solo, then one of the heroes of the New Jedi Order due to the role he played in winning the war against the Yuuzhan Vong, to the dark side of the Force. This, in turn, led him down the path of committing several atrocities against not only his own family and the Jedi Order, but also against the galaxy and Galactic Alliance, before finally being killed by his twin sister, Jaina. Jacen's fall to the dark side also had even further ramifications beyond his role in the Galactic Civil War, in that it lead to misguided efforts at repression and control of the Jedi Order by the new head of the Galactic Alliance afterwards.

Source(s):Wookiepedia

Written by Mara Butler

Syndicated from Culture Slate

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