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Elecia Zeveron, also known as "The Mother," was a human female from the Core Worlds who was the spiritual leader of the Path of the Open Hand cult around 382 BBY. She was the sister of the Jedi Knight Oliviah Zeveron.

Zeveron came to the Path's headquarters on the planet Dalna as a refugee and rose to prominence after joining the religion due to her Force visions, which led the members of the Path to view her as a prophet. She quickly replaced Werth Plouth, the Herald, as the leader of the cult, and began expanding the group's operations. Zeveron encouraged the Path's pre-existing belief that the Force needed to be freed from those individuals capable of using it, such as the Jedi Order, which the Mother had a particular distaste for. Zeveron founded a team, the Children, to "liberate" Force artifacts from other worlds and bring them to her. She also sought out wealthy benefactors for the cult, and began the construction of the Gaze Electric, a starship intended to become the Path's new headquarters so they could spread their word throughout the galaxy.

Biography[]

Early life[]

Elecia Zeveron was a human woman, low-level Force-sensitive, and sister of Oliviah. During their youth, they were discovered by the Jedi Order, which took Oliviah away to be trained but refused the less-sensitive Elecia; as a consequence, Elecia came to nurture an intense grudge against the Jedi and her sister which lasted for the rest of her life.^[4]

Leaving the Core Worlds, Zeveron eventually came to lead a crew of thieves. Around 396 BBY, they planned and enacted a heist at Reena University on Reena during the Queen's Bloom Festival, in the course of which Zeveron crossed paths for the first time with a young student named Axel Greylark, who would become a valuable asset to her in years to come.^[5]

Cult leader[]

Presenting herself as a refugee from the Core Worlds,^[2] Zeveron eventually made her way to the Outer Rim world of Dalna along with waves of others as the Galactic Republic expanded towards new worlds in the Galactic Frontier. Many of the new colonists were faced with challenging circumstances as communications were still unreliable due to the time it required them to reach their destination, and many were forced to flee conflicts such as the Forever War between Eiram and E'ronoh. On Dalna, such refugees were welcomed and helped by a missionary group called the Path of the Open Hand. The Path was a cult which worshipped living in harmony with the Force, including the principle of giving gifts to others who would then extend gifts in return. Their philosophy also included complete abstinence from using the Force, believing that such use could have dramatic consequences in distant places for away.^[2]

Elecia joined the Path^[2] and falsely claimed herself^[4] to be a prophet, supposedly receiving visions from the Force that confirmed the rightfulness of the Path's views. Believing she had been sent to them by the Force, the Path's members were taken by these claims and quickly elevated Elecia as their spiritual leader, granting her the title of "Mother." Although the Path had an existing leadership in the form of a Council of Elders and a Nautolan^[2] named Werth Plouth,^[7] who led the group under the title of "Herald," the newly titled Mother supplanted them in the hierarchy of the Path, become the cult's de facto leader. With her newfound authority, she expanded on the Path's ideology, giving it a more active role than the initial passive and missionary focus that she had found it under. Elecia preached that the focus should not simply be to resist interacting with the Force, as other groups such as the Jedi Order did, but to "free" the Force in all manners. Only this "freedom" would help the Force achieve true balance.^[2]

In order to achieve this goal, the Mother created a new group within the Path: the Children. Composed of Werth's daughter Kor Plouth, the human Cincey, a Mikkian thief named Treze, and Plouth's girlfriend Yana Ro, one of the cult's two Evereni members, the Children's official mandate was proselytizing, expanding the Path's beliefs to other planets along the Frontier. However, secretly, the Children's mission was to steal artifacts imbued with the Force and then returning them to Path's complex on Dalna. Such artifacts were then either destroyed or stored to prevent use, in line with the group's doctrine about freeing the Force.^[2]

The Mother was also instrumental in gaining donors for the Path, generous benefactors who funded some of their enterprises. One such project was the construction of a massive, hyperspace-capable starship called the Gaze Electric. The ship would allow the Path to become mobile, leaving Dalna to expand their presence beyond a single world.^[2]

Fleeing Dalna[]

In 382 BBY,^[8] Zeveron recruited the smuggler Radicaz Dobbs to help her locate parts of a set of three rods, Force artifacts which she particularly desired for her plans. She also accepted from Dobbs a jewel-like egg he had found on a Wild Space planet, sensing great potential within.^[2]

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 looking into them as likely 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.^[2]

After avoiding the Jedi visitors, the Mother confronted the duo after they broke into the Path compound to retrieve stolen Force artifacts. She hatched the egg to reveal a bizarre and unsettling creature she named the Leveler, which overwhelmed and destroyed Macri and Zink. Zeveron used the event to further spur the Path into fanaticism, claiming the Leveler was a gift from the Force, before leading the cult to flee Dalna on the Gaze Electric. Through the Mother's manipulations and related recent events, Marda became fanatically devoted to the Path's mission. Yana, meanwhile, had turned on the Mother after she arranged for the deaths of the Children during the ambush on Thelj. Although Marda did not believe her cousin, Yana plotted the Mother's downfall with the Herald, who sought to regain his control over the Path. Yana managed to escape the Mother's wrath when she happened to be holding the Rod of Seasons near the Leveler, making it follow her and accidentally taking on the position of its guide, forcing Zeveron to keep her alive.^[2]

Demise[]

Following the Night of Sorrow and Elecia's confrontation with her sister Oliviah, Marda turned on the Mother, having realized she never truly received visions from the Force and had been hypocritically using the Force to manipulate and influence others. Although Elecia offered to make a new incarnation of the Path with Marda by her side, Marda declared she would free the Force from manipulation, which Elecia initially suspected referred to the Jedi. However, Marda then turned the Leveler on Elecia, turning the leader of the Path into a husk.^[4]

Personality and traits[]

The Mother was a human female with brown skin and darker brown hair. She gained silver streaks in her hair after the birth of the Leveler. Zeveron strongly disliked the Jedi Order, and plotted to use the Path of the Open Hand to carry out operations against them.^[2]

Powers and abilities[]

Elecia Zeveron's Force visions led the Path of the Open Hand to venerate her as a prophet, as they saw the visions as a gift. Zeveron also had an unusually compelling presence, with the smuggler Radicaz Dobbs being particularly strongly affected. After meeting the Mother, Dobbs became quickly devoted to her service, despite having originally intended to con her, and felt deprivation whenever he was not around her.^[2] Zeveron had a latent, skilled use of a type of mind trick, being able to assert her will and cause affection and obedience in others.^[4]

Equipment[]

The Mother wore silver robes in a similar style to those worn by the other members of the Path of the Open Hand, but made of finer material.^[2] She carried Zallah Macri's lightsaber, and the Rod of Power.

Behind the scenes[]

Elecia Zeveron first appeared in the 2022 young-adult novel The High Republic: Path of Deceit, co-written by Tessa Gratton and Justina Ireland for the Star Wars: The High Republic multimedia project.^[2] She was first mentioned in an episode of The High Republic Show announcing media from Phase II of the project,^[9] and her first name was revealed in an excerpt of Path of Deceit published on StarWars.com.^[10] Zeveron's full name was revealed in a Characters of Star Wars: The High Republic video about her.^[11]

Appearances[]

Sources[]

Notes and references[]