Alright, I have unfortunate news for the P@treon, I did not have time to pump out 2 chapters for next week, so I apologise. Im posting these two chapters on Webnovel at least before im away from my computer. Editing is tough on the phone, and I don't want crap made when im out of town and posted on vacation. So I hope you can manage without two chapters this week and enjoy them when they do release, instead of garbage being produced in mass.
Enjoy
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The gathering did not happen on Mandalore.
That was the first rule.
No one said it aloud, because no one in the chamber needed it explained. Mandalore watched itself too closely now. Satine's informants filled the cities. Death Watch sympathizers hid in old tunnels and forgotten estates. Republic eyes drifted wherever the Clone Wars sent ships, and Separatist ears had learned to listen for any fracture that might become useful.
So the clans came elsewhere.
The place had no name on Republic charts.
It was an old mining moon in a dead system beyond the common lanes, a broken sphere of iron-gray rock circling a gas giant whose storms glowed faintly green beneath bands of poisonous cloud. The mines had been abandoned for generations. The surface was cold and scarred, the atmosphere thin enough that most species needed a breather outside the shielded caverns. Old landing craters pocked the regolith. Rusted cargo towers leaned like corpses against the horizon.
Inside the moon, however, the Mandalorians had woken the dead place again.
Forges burned beneath the stone.
Landing bays had been cut into the mountain walls and hidden behind sensor-baffling screens. Armorers worked in silence at anvils older than some Republic systems. Banners hung from durasteel rafters, some bright and recently painted, others worn thin by exile, blood, and years spent folded in secret compartments.
House Ordo.
House Kast.
Clan Awaud.
Clan Rook.
Clan Eldar.
Clan Skirata.
Clan Fett.
And above the central dais, half-hidden in the red forge light, hung a banner most living Mandalorians had never seen outside forbidden family vaults.
Black field. Bronze war-crown. A jagged crimson blade splitting the center.
House Vhettar.
The buried house.
The old war-house.
The house that claimed descent from Mandalore the Ultimate's blood and carried, through Mavrek Vhettar, the last acknowledged line of that ancient claim before history and defeat scattered it into exile.
The banner had not been raised publicly in centuries.
Tonight, it hung over a hall full of armored men and women who had crossed half the Outer Rim to stand beneath it.
They did not come as a senate.
Mandalorians did not need soft words for hard things.
They came armed.
Some wore polished beskar that bore the marks of old houses. Others wore mismatched plates scavenged, inherited, reforged, or won from dead enemies. There were bounty hunters with rifles slung over their backs, clan elders with weathered helmets under their arms, exiled warriors whose armor bore no sigil at all because they had been stripped of the right to wear one. Humans, near-humans, Zabraks, Twi'leks, a handful of Devaronians, and even a few older warriors whose bloodlines had mixed so deeply with Mandalorian adoption that species had become less important than oath.
They spoke in low voices while the last arrivals entered.
At the center of the hall stood a round iron table, its surface scarred with knife marks and old heat burns. Around it waited the alors, captains, and representatives of the gathered clans.
No throne stood there.
Not yet.
That absence was the point.
Varek Ordo stood with both hands resting on the rim of the table, broad-shouldered and gray at the temples, his armor dark green and black. His helmet sat before him, its visor painted with old clan markings that had survived more wars than some of the younger fighters in the room had survived campaigns.
He watched the hall until the murmurs settled.
Then he spoke.
"We've waited long enough."
The words did not boom. They did not need to. They carried because every person present had already come with the same thought burning somewhere inside them.
Across the table, an older woman in red-brown armor gave him a hard look. This was Alor Vesh Kast, sharp-eyed, silver-haired, her face lined by age and command rather than softness.
"Careful," she said. "Impatience has ruined stronger clans than yours."
Varek Ordo did not take offense. "Patience has buried stronger ones too."
A few warriors murmured at that.
Near the edge of the table, a representative of Clan Skirata leaned back against a stone pillar, arms folded over battered gray armor. His name was Toren Skirata, one of Kal's older cousins, and though he had none of Kal's exact authority, he carried enough of the family's stubbornness to make up for it.
"You called us here to say what everyone already knows," Toren said. "Say the name instead."
The hall quieted further.
Varek looked to the banner above them.
"Skywalker."
The name moved through the gathering like a spark passed from hand to hand.
Some whispered it.
Some did not.
All knew it.
Anakin Skywalker. Jedi Knight. Republic General. Commander of the 501st. The masked warlord with red-marked ships and victories trailing behind him like smoke. To the Republic, he was a battlefield savior. To the Jedi, depending on which one spoke, he was either their greatest weapon or their greatest concern.
To the clans gathered under stone and forge light, he was something older.
He was the blood of House Vhettar.
The heir of Mavrek Vhettar, who had carried the broken line of Mandalore the Ultimate into exile and hidden it from enemies who would have hunted it into extinction. Mavrek had vanished into wars beyond Mandalorian space, tied his blood into stranger legacies, and left behind a line no one expected to rise again.
And then Anakin had appeared.
Not raised among them.
Not sworn by their fires.
Not even fully aware, some believed, of what his name meant to Mandalore.
But blood did not ask permission to matter.
Vesh Kast's gaze lifted toward the banner. "He doesn't claim us."
"Not yet," Varek said.
"That is not a small thing."
"No," he agreed. "It is not."
A younger warrior from Clan Rook slammed a fist against the table. "Then we bring him. We show him the clans, the banners, the oaths. He's fought half the galaxy already. Mandalore should be his easiest war."
Several voices rose in approval.
Others answered with irritation.
Toren Skirata pushed off the pillar. "You don't drag a man like Skywalker by the collar and expect him to kneel where you point."
The Rook warrior turned. "Who said kneel?"
"You did, whether you heard yourself or not."
Before that could become an argument of hands rather than words, Varek Ordo struck the table once with his palm. The sound rang hard enough to silence the chamber.
"We are not here to speak like children hungry for a banner to chase," he said. "We are here because Mandalore is dying in pieces."
That settled them.
Vesh Kast leaned forward. "Then speak of Mandalore."
Varek nodded.
"Satine Kryze holds the throne in all but name. She calls it peace. She calls it survival. I will give the Duchess this much: after the Civil War, when the clans were broken and our cities were ash, her way kept many alive."
That admission drew some hard looks from the more militant warriors, but no one interrupted.
Varek continued. "There was a time when her peace gave the wounded a chance to breathe. A time when mothers buried fewer children. A time when the galaxy stopped looking at Mandalore and seeing only raiders, crusaders, and hired guns. I will not lie and say that meant nothing."
He looked around the chamber.
"But breath is not life forever. A people cannot live forever by being harmless."
The room answered with a low rumble of agreement.
Vesh Kast spoke next, her voice colder. "Satine built a court that apologizes for every scar our people carry. She teaches children that the armor is shame, that the old songs are sickness, that strength itself is what doomed us."
"She wasn't wrong that strength without honor doomed us once," Toren Skirata said.
"No," Vesh replied. "But she cut out the heart to cure a fever."
An older man from Clan Eldar nodded grimly. "Our young leave for mercenary work because they have no place in their own homes. Our armorers work in secret. Our clan histories are treated like contraband. We survived the Civil War only to become ghosts in our own houses."
A bounty hunter near the back called out, "And while Satine polishes speeches, Vizsla stains the old ways with butchery."
That name changed the mood faster than Satine's had.
Pre Vizsla.
Death Watch.
The hall did not merely dislike him. The hatred there had roots.
A warrior in blue armor, scarred across the exposed lower half of her face, stepped from the second rank. She wore no house sigil, only the faded mark of those who had once followed Jaster Mereel.
"My father rode with the True Mandalorians," she said. "He died because Tor Vizsla thought honor was weakness and slaughter was heritage. Now Pre wears the name like a crown and calls himself the future."
Her hand tightened around the edge of her helmet.
"Death Watch is not Mandalore. It is rot wearing our armor."
Several fists struck chest plates in agreement.
Varek Ordo let the anger pass through the room before he answered. "Pre Vizsla wants Mandalore broken enough to crawl to him. Satine wants Mandalore quiet enough to forget itself. Neither can lead us into what's coming."
"And Skywalker can?" Vesh asked.
It was not mockery. It was challenge.
Varek turned toward her. "You've seen the reports."
"I've seen Republic propaganda."
"You've seen more than that."
She did not deny it.
Everyone in the chamber had heard stories by now, though not all stories came from the same mouths. Some came from clone veterans who had fought under him. Some from bounty hunters who had crossed paths with Jango Fett. Some from old clan contacts on Kamino. Some from whispers out of Korriban, where a Republic starbase hung over the Sith homeworld and trained the 501st harder than most armies trained elite commandos.
Skywalker broke blockades.
Skywalker killed Separatist warlords.
Skywalker commanded millions.
Skywalker wore a mask no one saw beneath.
Skywalker carried the blood of Vhettar.
A woman from Clan Awaud spoke carefully. "He is Jedi."
There it was.
The objection no one could ignore.
"He was raised by Jedi," Varek said.
"That is not the same thing as saying he is not one."
"No," he admitted.
Toren Skirata gave a rough laugh. "He commands like no Jedi I've ever seen."
"That may be worse," Vesh said.
The hall murmured again.
Varek did not rush to defend him. That would have weakened the argument. Instead, he let the concern stand openly where everyone could see it.
"He is Jedi," Varek said. "He is also Vhettar. He is also tied to Fett, to Skirata, to soldiers who would follow him into fire without asking whether the Council approved the march. He has not claimed Mandalore because no one has yet put Mandalore before him in a way he cannot ignore."
"And if he refuses?" asked the blue-armored woman who had spoken of the True Mandalorians.
Varek looked at her. "Then we remain what we are. Exiles. Mercenaries. Forgotten clans whispering over cold forges while Satine and Vizsla take turns strangling our future."
No one liked that answer.
That was why it worked.
Vesh Kast leaned over the table, her silver hair catching the forge light. "House Kast will not bend knee to a boy because his grandfather carried an old name."
"He is not only a boy," Varek said.
"He is young enough."
"He has done more by twenty than most alors do by seventy."
"That does not make him Mand'alor."
"No," Varek said. "But it makes him possible."
The word settled strangely.
Possible.
Not chosen. Not crowned. Not inevitable.
Possible.
A Mandalorian in battered yellow armor stepped forward. He was old enough that one side of his face had gone stiff from some old injury, but his voice was still strong.
"I knew Mavrek Vhettar."
That silenced the chamber more completely than any command could have.
Even Varek turned toward him.
The old warrior continued. "Not well. No one knew him well. He was already half a ghost by then. But I saw him fight once on Galidraan's shadow routes, years before the slaughter there. He moved like a man trying to die but too stubborn to let anyone choose the hour for him."
The mention of Galidraan stirred old grief among the True Mandalorian remnants.
"He carried no banner," the old warrior said. "But he wore Vhettar's mark inside his armor. I saw it when the plates cracked. I asked him why he hid it."
"What did he say?" Vesh asked.
The old man's gaze drifted to the banner above the dais.
"He said some names are not meant to be raised until the galaxy is afraid enough to remember them."
No one spoke for a long moment.
Then Varek Ordo said, "The galaxy is afraid."
A low agreement moved through the hall.
"The Republic is at war," he continued. "The Separatists are spreading. The Jedi are bleeding. The Chancellor gathers powers no Republic leader should hold, and Mandalore sits in neutrality pretending history will politely pass us by. It won't."
He looked toward the banners one by one.
"Kryze cannot hold forever. Vizsla should not be allowed to rise. Kast knows this. Ordo knows this. Fett knows this. Skirata knows this. The forgotten clans know this most of all, because we are what happens when Mandalore tells its warriors to disappear."
A younger woman from Clan Ordo lifted her helmet. "So what do we do?"
Varek's answer came slowly.
"We prepare the call."
That stirred them.
Vesh's eyes narrowed. "Not the challenge?"
"Not yet."
"Why?"
"Because challenging Satine before Skywalker answers leaves a throne open for Vizsla to poison. Because moving too soon gives Death Watch the war they want. Because if we name Skywalker in public before he accepts, every enemy he has will race to use Mandalore against him."
Toren Skirata grunted. "That part's true."
Varek turned to him. "Skirata stands where?"
Toren looked toward the House Vhettar banner, then back to the table.
"Kal's loyalties are his own," he said. "But the clan knows where he's placed his trust. If Skywalker takes the mantle, Skirata won't stand against him."
That was not a full oath.
For Mandalorians, it was close enough for now.
Varek then looked to the empty space where a Fett representative might have stood more formally. Jango himself was not there. No one had expected him to be. He was too close to Skywalker, too tied to the war, too watched by too many eyes. But a woman in dull gray armor bearing the Fett sigil stepped forward from the edge of the gathering.
"Fett won't move before Jango speaks," she said. "But everyone here knows what Jango thinks of the boy."
That drew a few rough laughs.
The woman did not smile. "He calls him son when he's drunk enough to forget caution."
The laughter faded into something warmer, more dangerous.
Vesh Kast folded her arms. "And Ordo?"
Varek looked to his own people, then back to the council table.
"Clan Ordo throws its weight behind House Vhettar's claim," he said. "Not blindly. Not without terms. But if Anakin Skywalker accepts the call, Ordo will answer."
That was the first true pledge of the night.
Others followed, not all at once, and not all in the same way.
Clan Awaud pledged warriors but not ships.
Clan Eldar pledged armorers and old contacts in the neutral systems.
The True Mandalorian remnants pledged recognition if Skywalker upheld Jaster's Supercommando Codex and did not turn Mandalore into a raider state.
Several bounty hunter bands pledged information, routes, hidden depots, and the names of Death Watch sympathizers embedded in Satine's bureaucracy.
House Kast withheld full commitment, but Vesh did not walk away.
That mattered too.
Finally, when the pledges had been spoken and recorded in old fashion—by witness, by memory, and by blades laid briefly against the iron table—Varek Ordo looked up at the banner again.
"House Vhettar has no living alor present," he said. "Its heir doesn't know we stand here tonight. That is both risk and mercy. We do not chain him before he hears the call."
The old warrior who had known Mavrek nodded. "And if he hears it and still refuses?"
Varek was quiet for a moment.
"Then Mandalore remains lost a little longer."
No one liked that answer either.
But no one called it false.
Vesh Kast picked up her helmet. "When?"
"Soon," Varek said. "Not tonight. Not while Skywalker bleeds for the Republic and the Jedi watch him like a blade they fear will turn in the hand. We wait until the war pulls Mandalore closer to the fire. Satine will falter. Vizsla will move. When that happens, we make certain Skywalker knows there are clans ready to stand behind him."
"And if Vizsla moves first?" Toren asked.
Varek's voice went cold.
"Then we cut Death Watch out root and stem."
The hall approved of that more openly.
For all their arguments over Satine, over peace, over the Republic, over whether Anakin Skywalker was savior or risk, there was one thing that united the room without effort.
Pre Vizsla could not be Mand'alor.
Death Watch could not be Mandalore's future.
The gathering began to dissolve after that, not with ceremony but with quiet orders. Warriors returned helmets to their heads. Clan leaders moved into smaller circles to argue over logistics. Bounty hunters traded routes in low voices. Armorers discussed what could be moved without Satine's customs officials noticing. Old True Mandalorians stood beneath Jaster's remembered code and watched the younger fighters with guarded hope.
Varek Ordo remained at the table after most had gone.
Vesh Kast lingered across from him.
"You believe he'll come," she said.
Varek did not pretend certainty. "I believe the galaxy will leave him no choice."
"That is not the same thing."
"No," he said. "It isn't."
She looked once more at the Vhettar banner.
"Blood claims are dangerous."
"So are empty thrones."
Vesh considered him for a long while, then placed two fingers against the iron table in a gesture too old to be casual.
"House Kast will listen when the call is sent."
For her, that was no small concession.
Varek bowed his head once.
She left without another word.
At last, Varek stood alone beneath the old banner.
House Vhettar's mark hung motionless in the stale underground air, bronze and crimson beneath forge light. A dead house remembered by exiles. A forgotten line waiting for a son who had not yet claimed it.
Somewhere far away, Anakin Skywalker fought a Republic war, commanded clone legions, sat in councils with Jedi, and moved through the galaxy under a mask no Mandalorian present had ever seen lifted.
He did not know that clans were gathering in his name.
He did not know that old warriors had begun preparing oaths.
He did not know that Mandalore, fractured between pacifists and terrorists and ghosts, had started whispering for him.
But whispers had a way of becoming war cries.
And when Mandalore finally called, it would not ask softly.