Elecia Zeveron, also known by the moniker "The Mother," was a female human hailing from the Core Worlds. Around 382 BBY, she served as the spiritual guide for the Path of the Open Hand cult. She was the sister of Oliviah Zeveron, a Jedi Knight.
Having arrived at the Path's headquarters located on the planet [Dalna](/article/dalna] as a refugee, Zeveron gained influence within the religion. Her Force visions were the reason, leading Path members to consider her a prophet. She soon took over from Werth Plouth, the Herald, as the cult's leader and started expanding the group's activities. Zeveron reinforced the Path's already existing belief that the Force needed to be liberated from those capable of using it, such as the Jedi Order, a group the Mother particularly disliked. Zeveron established the [Children](/article/children_of_the_open_hand], a team tasked with "freeing" Force artifacts from various worlds and bringing them to her. She also sought out wealthy individuals to support the cult and initiated the construction of the Gaze Electric, a starship designed to be the Path's new mobile headquarters for spreading their message throughout the galaxy.
Elecia Zeveron was a woman of the human species, possessing a minor degree of Force-sensitivity. She was also the sister of Oliviah. In their youth, the Jedi Order discovered them, taking Oliviah for training but rejecting Elecia due to her weaker connection to the Force. This rejection fueled a deep-seated resentment towards the Jedi and her sister that persisted throughout her life.
After departing from the Core Worlds, Zeveron eventually became the leader of a crew made up of thieves. Around 396 BBY, they orchestrated a heist at Reena University on Reena during the Queen's Bloom Festival. During this event, Zeveron encountered a young student named Axel Greylark for the first time, who would later become a valuable asset.
Zeveron eventually found her way to Dalna, a world in the Outer Rim, presenting herself as a refugee from the Core Worlds. This occurred alongside waves of other refugees as the Galactic Republic expanded into the [Galactic Frontier](/article/galactic_frontier]. Many of these new colonists faced difficult circumstances due to unreliable communications and were forced to flee conflicts like the Forever War between Eiram and E'ronoh. On Dalna, the Path of the Open Hand, a missionary group, welcomed and assisted these refugees. The Path was a cult that practiced living in harmony with the Force, including giving gifts with the expectation of reciprocal gifts. Their philosophy also included abstaining from using the Force, believing it could have significant consequences elsewhere.
Elecia joined the Path and falsely proclaimed herself a prophet, claiming to receive visions from the Force that validated the Path's beliefs. The Path's members, believing she was sent by the Force, were impressed and quickly elevated Elecia to the position of spiritual leader, granting her the title "Mother." Despite the Path already having a leadership structure consisting of a Council of Elders and a Nautolan named Werth Plouth who led as "Herald," the newly appointed Mother superseded them in the Path's hierarchy, effectively becoming the cult's leader. With her new power, she expanded the Path's ideology, giving it a more active role compared to its initial passive and missionary focus. Elecia taught that the focus should not be merely resisting interaction with the Force, as groups like the Jedi Order did, but to "free" the Force in all ways. She claimed that only this "freedom" could bring true balance to the Force.
To achieve this goal, the Mother established a new group within the Path called the Children. This group consisted of Werth's daughter Kor Plouth, a human named Cincey, a Mikkian thief named Treze, and Plouth's girlfriend Yana Ro, one of the cult's two Evereni members. Officially, the Children were tasked with proselytizing and spreading the Path's beliefs to other planets in the Frontier. However, their secret mission was to steal artifacts imbued with the Force and bring them back to the Path's compound on Dalna. These artifacts were then either destroyed or stored to prevent their use, in accordance with the group's doctrine of freeing the Force.
The Mother also played a crucial role in securing donors for the Path, generous benefactors who funded some of their projects. It's also possible that she used the Path to mask smuggling operations, which also helped finance the group. One of these projects was the construction of a massive, hyperspace-capable starship called the Gaze Electric. This ship would enable the Path to become mobile, allowing them to leave Dalna and expand their influence beyond a single world.
In 382 BBY, Zeveron enlisted the help of smuggler Radicaz Dobbs to locate parts of a set of three rods, Force artifacts that she particularly desired for her plans. She also accepted from Dobbs a jewel-like egg he had discovered on a Wild Space planet, sensing great potential within it.
The Path became the subject of a Jedi investigation after the Children stole the Rod of Seasons artifact from Hynestia Prime. Jedi Master Zallah Macri and Padawan Kevmo Zink introduced themselves to the cult while investigating them as potential suspects. Zink, in particular, developed a mutual attraction with Marda Ro, Yana's cousin and the other Evereni member of the Path, who was a devoted and obsessive follower of the Mother.
After evading the Jedi visitors, the Mother confronted them after they broke into the Path compound to recover stolen Force artifacts. She hatched the egg, revealing a strange and disturbing creature she named the Leveler, which overwhelmed and killed Macri and Zink. Zeveron used this event to further incite fanaticism within the Path, claiming the Leveler was a gift from the Force, before leading the cult to flee Dalna aboard the Gaze Electric. Through the Mother's manipulations and recent events, Marda became fanatically dedicated to the Path's mission. Yana, however, turned against the Mother after she orchestrated the deaths of the Children during the ambush on Thelj. Although Marda didn't believe her cousin, Yana plotted the Mother's downfall with the Herald, who sought to regain control of the Path. Yana managed to escape the Mother's wrath when she happened to be holding the Rod of Seasons near the Leveler, causing it to follow her and unintentionally taking on the role of its guide, forcing Zeveron to keep her alive.
Following the Night of Sorrow and Elecia's confrontation with her sister Oliviah, Marda turned against the Mother, realizing that she had never truly received visions from the Force and had been hypocritically using the Force to manipulate and influence others. Although Elecia offered to create a new version of the Path with Marda by her side, Marda declared that she would free the Force from manipulation, which Elecia initially thought referred to the Jedi. However, Marda then turned the Leveler on Elecia, turning the leader of the Path into a husk.
Elecia Zeveron's Force visions led the Path of the Open Hand to revere her as a prophet, viewing the visions as a gift. Zeveron also possessed an unusually compelling presence, which particularly affected the smuggler Radicaz Dobbs. After meeting the Mother, Dobbs quickly became devoted to her service, despite initially intending to deceive her, and felt a sense of deprivation when he was away from her. Zeveron had a latent, skilled ability to use a type of mind trick, allowing her to assert her will and inspire affection and obedience in others.
The Mother wore silver robes similar in style to those worn by other members of the Path of the Open Hand, but made from finer materials. She carried Zallah Macri's lightsaber and the Rod of Power.
Elecia Zeveron made her first appearance in the 2022 young-adult novel The High Republic: Path of Deceit, co-authored by Tessa Gratton and Justina Ireland for the Star Wars: The High Republic multimedia project. She was initially mentioned in an episode of The High Republic Show announcing media from Phase II of the project, and her first name was revealed in an excerpt from Path of Deceit published on StarWars.com. Zeveron's full name was disclosed in a Characters of Star Wars: The High Republic video dedicated to her.