Author's Notes: I wanted to extend a very special "Thank You!" to everyone who has shown an interest and kept with the story through its entirety. As a token of my gratitude, I will be posting (bi-weekly) a short, three-part story entitled, "Interlude: The Templar's Temptation," that tells the story of Breanne and Noris and their fated meeting on Bevin.

Epilogue – Assassin and Templar

Wynsridge Mansion
Planet Blyne

The Rebellion against the Empire had lasted for nearly three years, and the Rebels had led quite the raid on the complex. What had once been a luxurious residence had become little more than a hollowed out series of cavernous walls. Two months ago, after the Empire fell at the Battle of Endor, the people had risen up against their Imperial oppressors, and ruins similar to this one were common throughout the galaxy. The Blyne residents had done well to loot back the treasures that were stolen from them during the Empire's reign, and it showed in the wrathful destruction throughout the empty structure.

Furniture had been overturned and torn apart, luxurious fabrics shredded to rags. Paintings were slashed, their frames broken into wooden shards throughout the rooms. Anything and everything of value no longer existed, and was either removed during the riots or was destroyed beyond repair. Walls still exhibited carbon scoring, and the colors that had once been so splendid on the plasteel was dirtied and chipped, showing the ruins that the mansion had become.

Despite all that was lost, Jaksen Wynsridge returned to the scene of everything he had once inherited and had worked so hard to preserve during the years he lived here. Unlike that noble count he formerly was who lived in luxury, he was now dressed more plainly than he had ever been. His white tunic and black pants were standard issue from common fabrics, rather than the silken materials he had always known. His unadorned, black boots crunched along the broken debris on the floor, glass and fabric scattered to the corners of the rooms. He pushed his toe along a mark of carbon scoring on the wooden floor, remembering a time when it had reflected the now-broken chandeliers from above in a glorious sheen, and the floor had accommodated at least a dozen dancing couples.

In an instant, a momentary flash of her bright smile came to him, and he remembered the night Breanne wore that hunter green gown, bringing out the emerald of her hazel eyes. Her hair had been curled so delicately, and she moved about the room as a vision of beauty and joy, excitedly discussing the plans for her impending nuptials with their guests. She had hung on his arm, her audience captivated and drawn in by her intellect – her personality a radiant sun amongst the Templars – and all she could brag about in that moment was how happy he had made her.

Stepping lightly and cautiously, the gray shadow stared down the once-rich noble before him as his thoughts were lost in the past. He, himself, had been visiting old ghosts as of late, and while he had not forgotten those lessons from his past life, he had forgotten that surge of anticipation and regret that had forced him to walk away from this existence. Noris Polona had spent nearly twenty-three years of his life hidden away, making amends with himself, and in that time, he found a kind of restless peace as he encouraged life to grow on his farm.

Watching the crops come to life from seeds and saplings had given him hope that he was not entirely the harbinger of death that his estranged wife had once declared of him after their infant daughter's unexpected passing. While his harvests thrived, he found a meditative therapy in that solace, using his hands for good in a way that was not to end life, but encourage it. And, while he was content on his farm, he was never truly happy.

These past three years were a learning experience for him – one in which the lessons he saw being taught at the Sanctuary of Inspired Hope were unlike those of his training. While the years of his physical training had never left him, and his body remembered what it was to attack and defend, there were lessons beyond the physical that he had never known. And, he would find out today if those alternate teachings "of inspired hope" were worth it.

The Templar on the ruined dance floor realized that he was not alone in his empty home, and he brought his eyes to the gray shadow that had stepped from the corner. Jaksen could not see the other man's eyes, as they were hidden by a cowl, but he sensed he knew who this shadow was and what the purpose of this intrusion held.

The gray shadow silently moved forward, his lifetime of lessons reminding him how to step without making any sounds. Noris had not worn these kinds of smoke-colored robes or dark brown boots since Bevin, and he had believed he never would again, but fate had sent him on this mission, and he refused to leave it unfinished.

He flexed his fingers on his right hand, glad that the blade he was recently given to replace the one he had lost a lifetime ago had been so willing to obey his commands during his practices. He thought he had given up this life for good, but when this opportunity arose, he needed the utmost of patience, as the conditions had finally become ideal for him to heed the calling for what had become the most personal mission he would ever undertake.

"You had a daughter, not of your blood," the hooded Noris spoke softly. "She spent her life abused under your supervision."

Jaksen stood his ground, and he offered no motion of threat. His voice was even-toned, yet carried no hint of remorse. "I wondered if I would ever meet the man who had seduced my wife."

"Breanne confided in me about her lonely existence, and when she chose her actions that night, I no longer wanted to ignore the connection we shared. Kaelyn, however, was never given the option of a choice, and to save your own pride, you confined my daughter to the life of a Templar's consort. I have come here of my own choosing to avenge what you did to her."

"I loved Breanne," the once-proud Templar confessed. "But, she betrayed that love in a way I have never been able to forgive. Whenever I looked at her daughter, all I could see was an Assassin that I had never met but had sworn an allegiance against."

"Kaelyn was a child – innocent and pure – but you refused to allow yourself to see beyond your own prejudices to realize that," Noris rebuked, his voice holding an underlying anger, but never raising in tone.

"You would have done no differently if a Templar child landed in your lap against your wishes," Jaksen retorted.

"I make no claims that I am a better man in that regard," Noris agreed, "But, I had lost a child once, and I do know that I would have been grateful for the chance to raise another."

Jaksen breathed softly and straightened his back, maintaining his arguments for mistreating his wife's daughter. "I gave that girl a home and allowed her to live in luxury, but she was never grateful."

"Because Kaelyn only wanted from you the one thing you refused to give," Noris shot back quietly, "Acceptance."

"So, this is how it ends for me," Jaksen replied, consenting to his fate and ignoring the Assassin's truthful words, "Not because of our war, but because of your daughter."

The Templar knew his death would happen one day, but he had not expected it under these circumstances. He thought it would be at the hands of an Assassin with a much-less personal interest – perhaps a young man or woman who was chasing him for one of the many ancient treasures he once harbored. Instead, he would meet his demise at the hand of an Assassin not much older than he was and for no reason of their ongoing war, but rather to avenge a child that had brought them together in opposing ways.

"Consider yourself lucky that I will make this as painless as I can for you," the gray shadow promised, his steps moving silently closer. "My daughter is made from a far kinder design than I am, and while she did not want me to do this, she was unable to change my mind. In compromise, I vowed to her that I would not make you suffer as she had."

Jaksen laughed briefly at that. "You'd be ending my suffering, Assassin. I've lost it all, and death would free me from a prison of failure."

"Then, Kaelyn would be glad to know I'm doing this out of mercy," Noris softly replied. He shifted his right wrist, and there was the slightest sound of metal releasing before snapping into place.

Taking a deep breath, the Assassin looked into the brown irises of Jaksen Wynsridge. The Templar's eyes revealed a sadness for the victory of the Empire that he had imagined but had never happened. Whatever sorrow there was for Breanne's loss had long faded, and all that was left was a man who held to his failed convictions of a galaxy controlled by a unified Empire under Templar influence. Unfortunately, the one thing Noris sought in Jaksen's eyes was nonexistent, and for as much as he searched, there was not even a shred of compassion in them for Kaelyn.

Bringing the blade upwards, Noris let his years of past experiences take over as the blade slipped more easily than he expected between the Templar's rib bones. Pushing with a final strike, the Assassin felt the forgotten, but familiar, silent explosion as the Templar's heart ruptured under the blade. He held the blade in this position for a few moments longer, kneeling with Wynsridge, as he helped him to the floor, and without words, he merely watched the life fade from the Templar's eyes.

Noris took a small, handkerchief-sized cloth from inside a pouch on his belt and wiped down the blade after he removed it from Wynsridge's body. Closing the blade, he then opened the cloth so that it revealed a random pattern of the blood he had cleaned off the weapon. In a corner of the diamond-shaped material the symbol of the Assassin had been embroidered in deep gray threads. He folded the Templar's eyelids closed before placing the cloth over his face and laying his arms over his bloodied torso, completing the ritual he had been taught in his youth.

As silently as he entered, Noris left the ruins of the mansion and felt the darkness of his personal mission recede, rather than claim him, as it had always done in the past. He knew now that the lessons he had recently learned at the sanctuary had taken hold, and it was time for him to return to the new life he had established for himself on Tiandul. His grandchild would soon be born, and the sanctuary had grown lively with the arrival of a certain pirate who decided that she would make a better adopted grandmother and mentor than a pirate or an Assassin at her age.

Thinking about the extended family that his daughter had embraced at the Sanctuary of Inspired Hope, Noris had found a balance of happiness and contentment that he had never known prior to the three years he had been there, and for the first time in his life, he finally knew what it was to live.