The mighty Sith dynasty founded on the planet Kesh by the survivors of the shipwrecked Omen has endured for a thousand years—and so has the merciless Sith code, which prizes power above all else. Lady Orielle Kitai enjoys power as the scion of a noble family and member of the elite Sith Sabers. But Lillia Venn, as reigning Grand Lord of the Sith, possesses absolute power…and is determined to keep it.
When a failed regicide sparks a political—and literal—bloodbath, and suspicion falls on Orielle, she is swiftly condemned to slavery by the ruthless Grand Lord Venn. But seeing the cunning power play for what it is, Orielle vows to strike back. And at the ramshackle home of a poor dirt farmer with an astounding secret, she discovers the means to make her vengeance a devastating reality.
Purgatory occurs approximately 1,140 years after the events of Precipice, the first novella in the series. It is told from the point of view of two protagonists, Orielle Kitai, a Sith Saber, and her friend Jelph Marrian, a slave who specialized in selling high-quality fertilizers to Keshiri farmers. Unknown to Orielle, Jelph was also a secret Jedi Shadow who had become stranded on the planet Kesh. Following the death of the Lost Tribe of Sith's founder Yaru Korsin in 4975 BBY, his daughter Nida Korsin had ruled the continent of Keshtah Minor as Grand Lord for 79 years. While she produced a son named Donellan, he did not outlive his mother. As a result, Nida instituted a succession system based on merit. Thus, successive Grand Lords were elected from among the seven High Lords of the Tribe.
Since 5000 BBY, the continent Keshtah Minor had been ruled by the Lost Tribe of Sith, the descendants of a group of Human Sith who had become stranded on the planet during the Great Hyperspace War. Force-sensitive Sith formed the elite of Keshiri society while non-Force sensitive Humans formed a Yeomanry class. The indigenous Keshiri, a purple-skinned humanoid species, formed the bottom of Sith society and were predominantly serfs. In addition, outcasts from the Tribe formed a slave class. Despite their class and social differences, Orielle and Jelph developed a close and friendly relationship. Orielle met Jelph while looking for beautiful flowers to decorate her mother Grand Lord Candra Kitai's booth prior to the Donellan's Day, an annual holiday which commemorated the memory of Donellan.
The first protagonist Orielle Kitai led a privileged and sheltered life due to her mother Candra's status as High Lord. During that year's Day of the Dispossed, Candra and her daughter along with other members of the ruling elite including the current Grand Lord Lillia Venn are present in the capital city Tahv's arena Korsinata for a game of rake-riding. Rake-riding was a competitive blood-sports which involved teams of riders competing on flightless uvaks, winged reptilian beasts native to Kesh. These particular uvaks have had their wing muscles cut at birth, rendering them flightless. For that game, Candra and Orielle had sponsored a rake-rider known as Campion Dey.
Unknown to Candra and Orielle, Dey had planned to assassinate Lillia during the games. However, this attempt was unsuccessful and Dey was killed. Candra and Orielle were shocked and horrified that their sponsored rake-rider would attempt to assassinate one of their family's political allies. Hoping to prove her family's innocence, Candra ordered her daughter to return to the family estate while she remains behind. After two hours, Orielle returned to her family's estate only to discover that the Grand Lord had unfairly blamed her family for the assassination and had ordered their disenfranchisement and enslavement.
Under Lillia's orders, the family's Keshiri servants had destroyed all of her family's possessions in a public bonfire. As a sign of her diminished status, Orielle is renamed "Ori", a nickname she had used while around Jelph. In addition, Lillia had ordered the summary executions of two other High Lords Dernas and Pallima, the leaders of the Red and Gold Factions respectively.
In desperation, Ori takes her uvak to Jelph's remote farm where she attempted to find comfort and solace in her friend. During her time there, Ori and Jelph discussed whether the "downfall" of her family was the result of a conspiracy engineered by the Grand Lord. Jelph advised Ori not to return because he believed that her life was in danger. He speculated that Lillia must have ordered the attempted assassination on herself in order to make Ori and her mother political scapegoats. The fact that she had spared them rather than execute them indicated that the Grand Lord had wanted to make a public example of them. In the end, Ori agreed to stay with Jelp until it was safe and to temporarily abandon her plans to regain her family's position.
Several days later, Ori was home alone on the farm while Jelph was away checking his traps in the forest. During that time, Ori's Sith rivals Flen and Sawj Luzo, arrived at the farm and killed her uvak Shyn on the pretext that slaves were not allowed to own uvaks. Prior to Dey's failed assassination attempt, the two Luzo brothers had been Ori's rivals while she was training to be a Sith Saber. They also produced two confessions from her mother Candra which claimed that she conspired with both Dernas and Pallima. Under duress, the Luzo brothers also confiscated her lightsaber . To mark her new status as a slave, Ori was given a spade.
After the Luzo brothers depart, a humiliated Ori descended into a fit of rage. She damaged and destroyed several items of Jelph's property including his plants, wooden cart, and barn. During that time, Ori discovered an Aurek-class tactical strikefighter beneath a mound of manure. Ori quickly realized that the starship could become a way for her and her mother to regain their loss status within the Tribe. Since the Tribe's ancestors had crash-landed on Kesh, the Tribe had been unable to leave the planet and return to the stars for more than a millennium. The Tribe had always hoped to return to the wider galaxy to create their own interstellar empire.
By the time that Jelph had returned to the homestead, he found that Ori had already left and that his starship had been uncovered. As a member of the secretive Jedi Covenant, Jelph was committed to eradicating any Sith influence and preventing the Tribe from posing a threat to the galaxy. Fearing that the Tribe would pose a threat to the galaxy, he resolved to stop his friend Ori from revealing the presence of a Jedi and a hyperspace-capable starship to her people.