During the initial years of the Galactic Civil War, Ta'a Chume held the position of Queen Mother for the Hapes Consortium. She was also the mother of Isolder and the grandmother of Tenel Ka Djo. Notably, in 8 ABY, she made a significant decision to open the borders of the Hapes Cluster to the wider galaxy while serving as the Hapes Consortium's sovereign.
Ta'a Chume, a leader primarily focused on maintaining her power, readily resorted to murder to safeguard her position and the monarchy. This included orchestrating the assassinations of her first born son, the fiancée of her younger son, and her daughter-in-law. Despite being confined to house arrest for the latter's murder, she orchestrated an assassination attempt on her newborn great-granddaughter, Allana, in 36 ABY. As retribution, Jacen Solo, Allana's father, employed the Force to induce a brain hemorrhage, causing her to fall into a coma.
Ni'Korish was Ta'a Chume's mother, and she grew up with several sisters. Although specifics about her childhood are limited, it is known that Ni'Korish's deep-seated animosity towards the Jedi significantly influenced her.
Following her mother's passing, Ta'a Chume ascended to the role of Queen Mother, becoming the absolute ruler of the Hapes Consortium. She took a consort, and together they had two sons, Kalen and Isolder. Her consort's death occurred when their sons were still young.
During her time as the Hapes Consortium's leader, Ta'a Chume governed with a firm hand and strongly advocated for a robust military presence. This was largely due to the Galactic Empire's repeated attempts to invade the Hapes Cluster. Thanks to the substantial navy she had built to counter these incursions, the majority of these attacks were successfully repelled.
In 2 ABY, Ta'a Chume determined that her eldest son, Kalen, lacked the necessary leadership qualities, so she arranged for pirates to kidnap and murder him near the Terephon system. This incident motivated her younger son, Isolder, to work undercover as a privateer for two years in order to find those responsible.
Ta'a Chume, impressed by Isolder's determination, appointed him as the new Chume'da. Shortly after Isolder became engaged to Elliar, a Hapan noble, Ta'a Chume was displeased. Believing that Elliar's pacifist views would lead to the downfall of the Hapes Consortium, she orchestrated Elliar's drowning in one of Hapes' reflecting pools. It would be several years before Isolder discovered his mother's involvement in both deaths.
Leia Organa visited Ta'a Chume on Hapes in 8 ABY to try to establish an alliance between the Hapes Consortium and the New Republic. Isolder saw Organa from a distance while she was discussing details with Ta'a Chume and immediately fell in love with her. He asked Ta'a Chume for permission to marry Organa, which she only granted to ensure his loyalty to her. In reality, she opposed Organa's beliefs and only maintained the appearance of an alliance for Isolder's sake.
When the Hapan fleet arrived at Coruscant in 8 ABY to officially propose the alliance, each of the Hapan worlds presented Organa with a gift. Hapes' gift was Isolder's marriage proposal. Hapan assassins, acting on Ta'a Chume's orders, targeted Organa as she considered the proposal. Isolder thwarted the plot, but before Ta'a Chume could plan another attempt, Han Solo kidnapped Organa and took her to Dathomir to win her over. Ta'a Chume used her network of spies to find Solo and have him killed, as Hapan honor required the Queen Mother to do whatever it took to protect her successor.
Ta'a Chume sent her spies to question Omogg, a Drackmarian warlord and one of the last people Solo had been seen with, after a lead was discovered. She had some of her other spies run a check on Omogg's navicomp before questioning her, determined to get the information by any means necessary. Omogg refused to give Ta'a Chume's spies any details because she wanted to claim the enormous bounty on Solo's head for herself, so they became enraged and attacked her. Ta'a Chume asked Omogg what punishment she should give her errant underlings to gain the Drackmarian's trust. Omogg instructed her to force them to breathe methane. Ta'a Chume concurred, hoping to learn more about Solo in exchange, but the Drackmarian only consented to give the information to Luke Skywalker. She still had the information from the navicomp sweep she had her spies perform earlier, so she used it to send the Hapan fleet to Dathomir, even though she was a little taken aback.
She invited Skywalker to dine with her and Isolder aboard Star Home because she was intrigued by him. She tried her best to seduce him during dinner and told him a lie about a small Jedi academy that had been established on Reboam during the Great Jedi Purge. Skywalker, however, realized that she did not have his best interests at heart when she revealed that detail, and he and Isolder left Star Home for Dathomir.
During the Battle of Dathomir, Ta'a Chume and the Hapan fleet arrived on Dathomir and assisted New Republic forces in defeating Warlord Zsinj. Isolder announced his intention to marry Teneniel Djo, one of the local Witches of Dathomir, during a victory celebration on Dathomir. Ta'a Chume was appalled that a Force-sensitive commoner from a remote planet would succeed her, and she objected to the union. Djo, however, used the Force on her, assuring her that she was not a pacifist and would not hesitate to execute the Queen Mother if necessary. Ta'a Chume relented and permitted the union, but there was no affection between her and her new daughter-in-law.
Isolder had also demanded that the Hapes Consortium join the New Republic, in addition to requesting permission to marry Teneniel Djo. Ta'a Chume had agreed to this demand, but members of the Hapan Royal Court dissented. Ta'a Chume withdrew from the Hapes/New Republic political alliance, citing that joining the New Republic would undermine internal stability. Under the Hapan Treaty, however, the Hapes Cluster's borders were now open to the rest of the galaxy.
Around the time of the birth of her granddaughter Tenel Ka in 10 ABY, Ta'a Chume abdicated the throne under unknown circumstances, with Teneniel Djo succeeding her as Queen Mother. Ta'a Chume was constantly irritated by Djo's refusal to heed the former Queen Mother's advice and by Tenel Ka's preference for her Dathomiri heritage over her Hapan one. She did, however, try numerous times to groom Tenel Ka as the future ruler of Hapes, despite her granddaughter's lack of interest.
Tenel Ka was sent to the Jedi Praxeum on Yavin 4 in 22 ABY to learn the ways of the Force. Ta'a Chume was horrified that her heir was training to be a Jedi, despite the fact that both of Tenel Ka's parents had encouraged her to go. Later that year, after a lightsaber accident had cost Tenel Ka a portion of her left arm, Ta'a Chume tried her best to persuade her granddaughter to abandon Jedi training and remain on Hapes full-time. She temporarily reconsidered her position on Tenel Ka's Jedi training, however, after Tenel Ka and her fellow Jedi trainees foiled an attempt on Ta'a Chume's life by her underling Yfra.
Even though she was no longer the reigning monarch, Ta'a Chume continued to have spies and underworld contacts who were loyal to her, and she frequently used them. Ta'a Chume used this spy network to learn that the seemingly peaceful aliens-first movement was not what it seemed when Tenel Ka called Hapes in 23 ABY to inform her parents about the Diversity Alliance. She later made use of an anti-Jedi faction named after her mother.
Ta'a Chume was among those who welcomed Leia Organa Solo to Hapes in 25 ABY, and she confided in the younger woman that she had been mistaken about her all those years ago. Ta'a Chume also expressed her disgust for her granddaughter Tenel Ka's refusal to take the throne during the same conversation, and she revealed that her son Isolder's marriage to Teneniel Djo was strained. Both women then watched as Isolder won an honor duel that sent the Hapan fleet to Fondor to assist in the Yuuzhan Vong War.
Following the disastrous Battle of Fondor, Ta'a Chume's already low opinion of her daughter-in-law plummeted even further when Teneniel Djo miscarried the Hapan heir, entered a semi-catatonic state, and neglected her duties as Queen Mother. Ta'a Chume secretly plotted to depose the "witch queen" by either finding a new wife for Isolder or reclaiming the throne herself.
Ta'a Chume set in motion a plan to replace Teneniel Djo with the grieving Jaina Solo when the survivors of the Mission to Myrkr (one of whom was her granddaughter Tenel Ka) piloted a stolen Yuuzhan Vong ship to Hapes. She saw Jaina as a younger version of herself, but with the potential to be even more powerful due to Jaina's Force abilities.
She began slowly grooming Jaina for Hapan political events by inviting her to political balls and introducing her to influential people in order to achieve her goal. She arranged for Jagged Fel to have an "accident" when Ta'a Chume discovered Jaina's interest in him, in order to preserve her plan. The sabotage plot was never carried out, and Fel was warned by his wingmate to stay away from Jaina.
Ta'a Chume also pressured Isolder to divorce the nearly catatonic Teneniel Djo, citing that he owed it to his people to provide them with a strong leader. She declared that she would retake the throne if he did not marry Jaina Solo, given Djo's incapacitation and Tenel Ka's refusal to accept the throne. Isolder promised to consider it because the last thing he wanted was for his mother to be back on the throne.
Ta'a Chume, unwilling to wait for Isolder's decision, dispatched some of her Ni'Korish assassins to poison Teneniel Djo. Ta'a Chume turned on the Ni'Korish in the aftermath of Djo's death and had them all arrested and executed. Jaina and Tenel Ka entered the room shortly after Ta'a Chume placed the crown on her head. Isolder removed the crown from her, and Ta'a Chume was aware that if he crowned Jaina, the younger woman would be Queen Mother of the Hapes Consortium, regardless of her desires. Tenel Ka, however, unexpectedly stepped forward to assert her birthright. Isolder then had Ta'a Chume arrested for planning Teneniel Djo's murder after placing the crown on his daughter's head.
Ta'a Chume was placed under house arrest rather than being tried and imprisoned, where she remained for the following nine years. However, time and imprisonment had not diminished her resolve, as the Gorog nest of Killiks contacted her in 36 ABY. They proposed a trade because they were unhappy with Hapan interference at Qoribu: they would assassinate Ta'a Chume's newborn great-granddaughter Allana in exchange for Ta'a Chume providing them with navicomputer technology.
Jacen Solo confronted Ta'a Chume after the attempted assassination of Allana was foiled by her parents, Jacen Solo and Tenel Ka, and demanded to know why she had planned the murder of her great-granddaughter. She informed Jacen after a brief Force-induced torture that she did not want the child of two Jedi to eventually rule Hapes, and that she did not want Hapes to become a Jedi kingdom. She also stated that if she were killed, arrested, or disgraced in any way, the Gorog would target Tenel Ka. Jacen used the Force on her to give her a brain hemorrhage in order to prevent any further attempts on the lives of Tenel Ka and his daughter by Ta'a Chume, rendering her comatose.
Ta'a Chume was a true sociopath who was described as manipulative, ruthless, arrogant, and intolerant of defiance.
Ta'a Chume, as the Queen Mother of a matriarchal society, was disappointed when her consort fathered sons. Ta'a Chume took it upon herself to manipulate events in order to choose her successor because she had no daughter by blood to rule in her place. As a result, Ta'a Chume's manipulations to select a "proper" successor resulted in the deaths of her firstborn son Kalen, her younger son's fiancée Elliar, and her daughter-in-law Teneniel Djo. She had several affairs in an attempt to produce a daughter, which unfortunately—from her perspective—resulted in the birth of several other sons. An attempt was made on Leia Organa's life because she once again believed Organa to be an unworthy successor, while her attempt on her great-granddaughter Allana was made because she believed that the child of two Jedi would eventually transform the Hapes Consortium into a Jedi dynasty.
During the Yuuzhan Vong War, Ta'a Chume devised a plan to replace the current Queen Mother, Teneniel Djo, with the Jedi Knight Jaina Solo. Despite her contempt for Jedi and other Force users, Ta'a Chume apparently saw no issue with replacing a Dathomiri Witch with a Jedi (albeit one who was sliding into the dark side at the time). This was most likely due to her belief that Jaina Solo was young, easily manipulated, and would eventually pave the way for Ta'a Chume's own return to power. The failure of the plot was her undoing, as she was placed under house arrest for Teneniel Djo's murder and was no closer to the throne she so desired.
Even shortly before she was rendered comatose, Ta'a Chume showed no remorse for the deaths she had orchestrated and even believed that as long as she was alive, there would be no attempts on Tenel Ka's life. Her concern for Tenel Ka, however, was not motivated by grandmotherly affection, but rather by a desire to reclaim the throne from her granddaughter when she was in a favorable position to do so. In a move that some might call poetic justice, Jacen Solo used the Force to incapacitate her with a brain hemorrhage, putting an end to her lust for power.
Dave Wolverton created the character Ta'a Chume, who first appeared in the 1994 novel The Courtship of Princess Leia.
The date listed in this article as her abdication date is based on conjecture from the novel The New Jedi Order: Dark Journey and from The New Essential Chronology, which has documented her as occupying the post as late as 8.5 ABY. No canonical source has provided the official date.
Ta'a Chume was reintroduced as the former Queen Mother of Hapes in the Young Jedi Knights series, with no explanation as to why she had abdicated. The issue was not resolved in any of the sources she appeared in following the YJK series, so the circumstances surrounding her abdication remain unknown.