Gloyd

Gloyd, a male Houk, entered the world before the Great Hyperspace War. He began his life as a member of a team of brigands, working as both a gunner and a foot soldier. Throughout his career, he engaged in combat with the Jedi on numerous occasions. Once, a Jedi's lightsaber nearly severed his head, leaving a permanent scar on his face. Eventually, Gloyd's crew became aware of the enigmatic Stygian Caldera region, which was generally avoided. Believing there was something extraordinary to be found, they ventured into the region, only to discover the strength of the hidden Sith Empire. Although most of his team was eliminated, Gloyd survived and eventually joined the Navy of the Sith Empire. He advanced to the rank of gunnery officer. By 5000 BBY, Gloyd served as the gunnery officer on the Sith dreadnaught Omen, leading his torpedo crew under a captain named Yaru Korsin, who was embarking on his first command. Sharing a similar dry wit and an uncommon dedication to their work among the other, more ambitious Sith, the two became close friends and had worked together on the Omen for decades by 5,000 BBY. In that year, Gloyd accompanied Korsin and the Omen on a mission to the largest moon of Phaegon III, aiming to mine Lignan, a valuable resource for the Sith's efforts in the Great Hyperspace War against the Galactic Republic. However, a Jedi attack caused the ship Harbinger, the Omen's sister ship, to collide with the Omen as it jumped to hyperspace. Knocked off course and heading to unknown regions, the Omen encountered a gravity well that severely damaged the vessel. Upon reverting to realspace, the Omen was drifting toward a mysterious planet named Kesh.

Despite the chaos erupting on the Omen's bridge, Gloyd remained calm, even smiling and joking with Yaru Korsin, his equally composed friend, although he was privately worried. The damaged Omen eventually entered Kesh's atmosphere, which was found to have breathable air, although Gloyd saw this as only a temporary reprieve. In a last-ditch effort to slow the ship's descent, Korsin, after consulting Gloyd, opened the Omen's torpedo doors using the Force, succeeding in his objective. However, the Omen was still destined to crash, and after everyone took cover, the dreadnaught collided with a granite ridge. Korsin was thrown forward and nearly impaled on a shattered viewport. Although Gloyd attempted to pull his friend to safety, the Omen's continued movement hindered his efforts. The Omen came to a halt on a precipice high in the mountains. Gloyd was among the 355 survivors of the disaster, including Korsin. Many had died, and twenty-one more perished during a perilous journey through a narrow mountain pass away from the shattered Omen to a clearing below. After the Sith established camp, Korsin's spice-addicted half-brother Devore attacked and killed the Omen's elderly navigator, Boyle Marcom, blaming him for the ship's crash. Shaken by the incident, Korsin sought Gloyd's counsel. Gloyd, who had not witnessed the violence, suggested that they had only two options: to either find a way off-planet or hide until everyone else killed each other. Gloyd believed that their only chance was to force the crew members to follow Korsin's lead and eliminate anyone who resisted.

Although Korsin followed Gloyd's advice, the situation for the stranded Sith did not immediately improve. The high altitude and extreme cold resulted in more wounded crew members dying, and Gloyd was forced to rely on bitter roots for sustenance. Later, Gloyd witnessed a large six-legged mammal jump into the camp, killing one of the injured Sith before it could be subdued. Salvation for Gloyd and the other Sith came unexpectedly when Adari Vaal, a native Keshiri woman, stumbled upon their isolated camp while fleeing from religious persecution. Despite Gloyd's initial discomfort, Vaal was persuaded to help the Sith escape their predicament. Vaal led the Sith to the Keshiri city of Tahv, where they pretended to be the native gods and gained the complete devotion and subservience of the Keshiri. Gloyd, along with the other Sith, was honored by the Keshiri, who allowed them to occupy homes previously held by their ruling council, the Neshtovar. Once settled, Gloyd accompanied Korsin on a mission to excavate metals needed to repair the Omen. Gloyd initially oversaw the creation of a new path to a nearby peninsula, a route necessary to transport materials to the Omen. While this phase was successful, they soon discovered that the metals they sought were nowhere to be found. For better or worse, the Sith were trapped on Kesh.

Over the next fifteen years, Gloyd remained a loyal servant to his friend, Yaru Korsin, now the Grand Lord of the newly formed Lost Tribe of Sith. However, Gloyd remained eager to leave Kesh and frequently presented Korsin with various escape plans in the new Sith temple built in the mountains at the Omen's crash site. In 4985 BBY, Gloyd proposed using one of the Omen's surviving boring lasers to send signals into space, hoping to attract the attention of a passing freighter. Korsin's science advisor, Ermon Parrah, quickly dismissed Gloyd's idea as ludicrous, and Korsin ultimately rejected it. Shortly after Gloyd's proposal, disturbing news arrived at the temple: the entire population of the southern town of Tetsubal, recently visited by Korsin's Sith pureblood advisor Ravilan Wroth for an ecological survey, had mysteriously died. Along with Korsin and his wife Seelah, the widow of the deceased Devore, Gloyd rushed to Tetsubal to examine the gruesome scene, finding only Wroth alive amidst a sea of Keshiri corpses. Fearing an airborne biological agent, Korsin sent a shaken Gloyd back to Tahv to ensure his daughter Nida safely returned to their mountain temple. The deaths in Tetsubal, along with similar incidents in other nearby towns, were eventually attributed to Wroth and his associates, manipulated by Seelah as part of a plot to eliminate the pureblood Sith from the Lost Tribe, paving the way for an all-Human version. Consequently, the Korsins led a wholesale purge of the forty-five Sith purebloods on Kesh, leaving Gloyd, the Houk, as the only non-Human remaining in the Tribe's ranks.

The deaths at Tetsubal caused unrest among the Keshiri, and the Lost Tribe feared losing their support. However, Gloyd played a crucial role in maintaining the natives' devotion by devising a scheme where a known Keshiri dissenter was brought to Tahv's Circle Eternal plaza to denounce the Sith, only to suddenly die, mysteriously choking to death on his own words. This display of dark side power was a complete success, reaffirming the Keshiri's belief in the Lost Tribe's divinity and effectively attributing the mass deaths in the Tetsubal region to the residents' lack of faith. By 4975 BBY, with all attempts to escape Kesh having failed, the Lost Tribe decided to remain there permanently. With no reason to stay by the Omen, they committed to leaving their mountain temple and living among the Keshiri. Their intentions were revealed in a grand ceremony at the Circle Eternal, before thousands of cheering Keshiri. An aged Gloyd served as Yaru Korsin's ceremonial bodyguard, personally introducing Adari Vaal, who was celebrated as the "Daughter of the Skyborn," and High Lord Jariad Korsin, son of Devore and Seelah, a leading candidate to succeed Yaru Korsin as Grand Lord. While Jariad was believed to be Korsin's heir, he was not the true choice. For years, Gloyd had helped Korsin conceal his daughter Nida's training in the dark side, which Seelah had tried to suppress, as the Grand Lord groomed her for his position.

Unbeknownst to Gloyd, Seelah and her son Jariad were plotting to overthrow Korsin, seeking revenge for Devore's death twenty-five years earlier. Although the circumstances of his death were kept secret, Devore had attempted to usurp control of the group during the Sith's time stranded in the mountains, leading to a lightsaber duel and his death at Korsin's hands. Adari Vaal had witnessed the event, and it was through her that Seelah learned how her husband had died. For decades, she and Jariad planned to kill Yaru Korsin, and they finally struck soon after the ceremony. Unfortunately for Gloyd, he was with his friend Korsin at the time, and they and four bodyguards were ambushed as they walked in the temple. Despite being outnumbered four to one and surrounded by Jariad and his contingent of Sith Saber warriors, Gloyd and Korsin resolved to fight. Fortunately, they received a timely distraction when a Keshiri resistance group, secretly led by Adari Vaal, stole the temple uvak beasts as part of a plan to destroy the Lost Tribe's control over their planet. The theft of the uvak allowed Gloyd and his crew to escape and make a stand on better ground. Gloyd eventually became separated from Korsin and was pursued into another part of the complex by Seelah's warriors. Gloyd fought back with all his might, valiantly holding out against wave after wave of enemies despite his age. However, his and Korsin's time was running short.

As Gloyd's last stand neared its end, Korsin played his trump card: Nida Korsin and her Skyborn Rangers uvak-riding club arrived as reinforcements, turning the tide of the battle. As Seelah's plan crumbled before her eyes, Gloyd brought the fight to her chamber. Cornered, Gloyd knew his end had come, and he intended to take everyone with him. Gloyd produced a proton detonator, a weapon he had kept hidden since the Omen's crash twenty-five years earlier. Gloyd detonated the device, killing himself but collapsing the entire room on his enemies. In the end, Seelah's coup was a complete failure. Jariad died in combat with Nida and Yaru Korsin, and although Seelah survived, Gloyd's proton detonator had severely wounded her, permanently disabling her legs. Although Yaru died from his injuries, Nida Korsin lived to take over the Lost Tribe. By 3000 BBY, 2000 years after the Sith's arrival on Kesh, Gloyd was still remembered by the Keshiri and the Lost Tribe. In that era, Gloyd was revered by a political faction known as Force 57, comprised of disfigured Humans who admired the "Fifty-seven" non-Humans of the Lost Tribe's early days. Gloyd was remembered as a figure to be pitied, the one non-Human that the Korsins kept alive, like a pet. Gloyd was also remembered in the form of the exclamation "Gloyd's blood!," used most notably by Grand Lord Varner Hilts.

Gloyd, a large Houk, was a rough but friendly individual with a sharp sense of humor and a large appetite, capable of joking even in the most desperate situations. Gloyd possessed a dry wit, matching that of his close friend, Yaru Korsin. Over his years as a bandit and Sith soldier, Gloyd became skilled in combat, complementing his physical strength. As a gunnery officer, he had extensive knowledge of torpedo systems. Gloyd was utterly loyal to Korsin, serving faithfully by his friend's side for decades and always addressing him respectfully as "Commander." Gloyd's brutish exterior concealed his intelligence and insight, and during the uncertain early days on Kesh, Gloyd proved to be an invaluable advisor to his captain. Unlike other Sith, Gloyd was not driven by ambitious pursuits, instead focusing on his job, a dedication he shared with Korsin. Gloyd was also highly imaginative, devising numerous outlandish plans to help the Lost Tribe escape Kesh, although all were deemed impractical. Additionally, he conceived the idea to kill the Keshiri dissenter through the Force, a move that restored the natives' devotion. Gloyd never felt truly comfortable on Kesh, accustomed as he was to a life of battle. In the end, he demonstrated unwavering resolve and valor in combat.

Gloyd made his first appearance in John Jackson Miller's 2009 eBook Lost Tribe of the Sith: Precipice, the first installment in the nine-part Lost Tribe of the Sith series. Gloyd was then featured in the next three installments of the series: Skyborn, Paragon, and Savior. Furthermore, Gloyd was mentioned in a later installment of the series, Pantheon.