Ma'lash: the Blade of Amon

Ma'lash was the highlord of the Tal'darim, the red masked ruler of Slayn and, by the reckoning of his own people, the most powerful protoss alive. He rose through the Chain of Ascension on a reputation for cruelty rather than mere strength, and the belief that Amon himself favored him earned him the name the Blade of Amon. He held the throne with the help of Alarak, who saved him from a challenger who had learned the truth about their god, and he lost it years later to Alarak in the same pit, with the warriors of Hierarch Artanis arrayed against him.

The Chain and the pit#

Tal'darim society ran along the Chain of Ascension, a rigid order said to descend from Amon himself, in which every warrior could command those beneath and gaps opened only when someone died. The formal route upward was Rak'Shir, a duel fought at the Pits of Ascension on Slayn, always begun at sunrise, in which two primaries struggled to force one another over the lip of a fiery pit. Others bound themselves to a primary as supplicants and lent their psionic strength, so that a single duel might involve two combatants or thousands. Killing a superior outside Rak'Shir brought a long and public execution. Refusing a declaration was cowardice.

Ma'lash climbed that chain with what Alarak later described as brutal wrath. He was strong, but strength alone did not make his name. He took a sadistic pleasure in killing slowly, bringing opponents to the edge of death and then holding them there, tormenting them long after the outcome had stopped being in doubt. The count of the dead grew, and with it the conviction among the Tal'darim that no ordinary protoss could fight as he fought. They decided the Dark God had blessed him, and called him the Blade of Amon.

The highlord's station#

The highlord sat at the top of the Chain and ruled the Tal'darim outright. By the laws of the Chain the office belonged to the strongest, and only the First Ascendant, the one ranked directly beneath, was permitted to declare Rak'Shir against the holder. The armor of the highlord served as both ceremonial adornment and a conduit of raw power, studded with blood shards and fueled by terrazine, channeling its wearer's fury straight into the bane blades. Beneath the highlord came the ascendants, ranked so that a lower number meant greater standing, then votaries, then the supplicants who gave their essence to their betters, and finally the zealots at the bottom, dangerous precisely because they had everything to prove.

The Tal'darim had held to that structure since long before Ma'lash. Asked where the homeworld of his people lay, the first highlord had pointed at the ground beneath him and answered that it was wherever he trod. The edict never changed. Ma'lash inherited an order that recognized only ascent, and he had spent a lifetime proving he was better at ascending than anyone else.

Nuroka's heresy#

By 2506 the throne was Ma'lash's, and First Ascendant Nuroka moved against him. Nuroka had learned what Amon actually intended, which was the extermination of every creation of the xel'naga, the Tal'darim included. Worse, he had concluded that Ma'lash knew it too and served anyway, which made the highlord a traitor to his own people rather than merely their tyrant.

Nuroka went to Fourth Ascendant Alarak for support before declaring. Alarak refused to grant it. The duel proceeded regardless, with Second Ascendant Guraj declaring for Ma'lash and Third Ascendant Zenish declaring for Nuroka. Alarak attended and declared for neither, which surprised the assembly without technically breaking custom. Partway through he attacked Guraj, killed her, and joined his power to Nuroka's, driving Ma'lash back toward the pit. It was at that moment, with the highlord nearly over the edge, that Nuroka declared aloud what he knew of Amon's plans and said that Ma'lash knew it as well.

Alarak had what he wanted. He declared for Ma'lash, and the highlord, restored, broke Nuroka with ease. Then he refused to finish it. He drew the duel out for the rest of the day, destroying Nuroka's mind and body by degrees before finally throwing him into the pit.

Afterward Ma'lash weighed the problem that had just promoted itself. Alarak would rise to First Ascendant, and Alarak was clever enough to have understood everything said in the pit. He asked whether Nuroka's words had shaken his faith in Amon, and Alarak said they had not. Ma'lash told him he knew his true strength and could beat him one on one. He also observed that too many high ranking Tal'darim had already died that day. He let Alarak live and handed him his new duties.

Atrias and the void catalyst#

Ma'lash later led the Tal'darim to an ancient xel'naga temple in the Atrias system, where Amon had been reborn. When Dark Prelate Zeratul and Praetor Talis came to investigate, the highlord ordered his warriors to seal the temple entrance and hold it against the intruders or answer to him for the failure.

Talis broke the entrance open and Zeratul went inside with a company of stalkers. Ma'lash ordered his forces to bar the passages and buy him time while he conjured his god. Amon manifested before him out of a void catalyst, and Ma'lash reported the Nerazim's arrival. Amon told him to ready his forces for war and await further instruction. The highlord taunted Zeratul's company the whole way in, and when they finally reached the void conduit he warped out and was gone.

Rak'Shir on Slayn#

Alarak's doubt, planted by Nuroka in the pit, eventually hardened into certainty during the End War. He struck a bargain with Artanis: help him unseat Ma'lash, and the Tal'darim would break off hostilities with the Daelaam.

When Alarak and the Daelaam came down on Slayn, Ma'lash was ringed by ascendants and by hybrid and void shades supplied by his god. Those guardians were killed one after another, and Alarak walked to the temple of the highlord and declared Rak'Shir. Ma'lash accepted and met him at daybreak, as the law required.

The two proved evenly matched. Neither could force the other back, and the duel might have run the way Ma'lash preferred, for hours, until the loser broke. But Alarak had brought help. The forces of Artanis fought at his back, and though Ma'lash summoned hybrid and loyal Tal'darim of his own, the balance tipped. He was driven to the edge of his end of the pit and cast down into the fire.

Alarak was named highlord in his place. The Blade of Amon, who had spent his life proving that the strong deserved to rule and that a slow death was the proper reward for weakness, was thrown into a pit by a subordinate he had knowingly declined to kill.