Star Wars: Path of Deceit is a Star Wars: The High Republic young adult novel written by Tessa Gratton and Justina Ireland.
150 years before the Great Hyperspace Disaster, the planet Dalna was home to the Path of the Open Hand, a religious cult led by an enigmatic figure known as the Mother that preached that Force must be untouched and liberated from those who would seek to misuse it, including the Jedi. When a Force artifact known as the Rod of Seasons is stolen by the Path, Jedi Master Zallah Macri and her Padawan Kevmo Zink are sent to Dalna to investigate. During the mission, Kevmo meets Marda Ro, a young and fervent believer in the Path who wishes to spread its teachings beyond Dalna.
It was released on October 4, 2022.
Tropes in this novel include:
- Anti-Magical Faction: The Path of the Open Hand preaches that the Force should not be used and only observed at a distance, which puts them at odds with the Jedi. Hypocritically, the Mother uses the Force to prop herself up as a prophet and an avatar of the Force's will.
- Call-Forward: Several to Phase I:
- The stolen artifact that leads the Jedi to Dalna, the Rod of Seasons, is one of the Nameless control rods.
- The Path of the Open Hand are the previous owners of the Gaze Electric, which would become Marchion Ro's personal flagship. This is a hint that the Nihil have roots in the Path, in addition to his ancestors Marda and Yana being part of the cult.
- One of the children on Dalna that Marda preaches to is Tromak, one of the future Elders of the Path in The High Republic Adventures (2021).
- Marda mentions that Dalna's surface may be ravaged volcanic activity some day, which is what happens to the planet in Mission to Disaster.
- Downer Ending: Zalla and Kevmo are both killed by the newly born Leveler. To make matters worse, Marda gets the wrong message from Kevmo's death and believes that he died as a consequence of the Jedi's teachings and not that the Mother is a wicked individual. And Jedha is marked as a target for proselytizing by the Path.
- My Significance Sense Is Tingling: Kor Plouth, one of the few Force sensitive members of the Path, gets a sense of unease from the large jewel that Sunshine gave the Mother and that the latter is keeping by her side. This is foreshadowing that the gem is actually a Nameless egg, and the one that hatches the Great Leveler.
- No OSHA Compliance: The Path compound is made of manually dug-out underground tunnels, with very little in the way of high-tech. The compound nearly gets flooded during a deluge of heavy rain, with only Kevmo's usage of the Force saving them.
- Pragmatic Villainy: The only reason the Mother doesn't kill Yana after she comes back from Thelj alive is that the Leveler took a liking to her after she picked up the Rod of Seasons, and this was after she had propped the Leveler up as a gift from the Force. Killing Yana then would immediately undermine her claims.
- Starcrossed Lovers: Kevmo and Marda manage to bond in spite of their ideological differences, but a number of factors are destined to keep them separate. The first is that, for Kevmo, the Jedi Code discourages romantic attachments, and for Marda, her fervent belief in the Path puts her at odds with the Jedi. It ends in tragedy, as Kevmo is killed by the newly born Leveler, and thanks to her deep upbringing in the cult and manipulation by the Mother, Marda is convinced that the Jedi are responsible for his death and decides to lead the Path to Jedha.
- Uriah Gambit: The Children's mission to Thelj was actually a suicide mission set up by the Mother to eliminate Yana Ro, who was not only one of the only people in the Path who rightly suspected she was a fraud, but was thinking of leaving. Out of the Children sent, only Yana survives the mission.
