Duel in the Dathomir landing meadow A duel took place in a landing meadow on Dathomir in 43 . 5 ABY . After a Sith strike team ' s failed attack on Jedi Grand Master Luke Skywalker and his son , Ben , the two Jedi tracked the strike team ' s sole survivor , Sith apprentice Vestara Khai , to Dathomir . When members of her Sith Tribe arrived to retrieve her , she helped them to capture several Nightsisters , a group of Dathomiri darksider s , who were then taken to the Sith fleet in orbit . Lord Viun Gaalan and three Sith Saber s remained behind to take Khai and one last Nightsister , Halliava Vurse , to the fleet . However , the Skywalkers and the Force - sensitive Dyon Stadd arrived and attacked the Sith while Khai went to retrieve Vurse . Luke Skywalker engaged Gaalan in a duel , while Stadd and the younger Skywalker took on the other three Sith . Stadd shot and killed one of the Sith , but another attacked Stadd while Gaalan ' s aide engaged Ben Skywalker . Working together , Stadd and Skywalker were able to quickly kill both of their opponents . Meanwhile , as the elder Skywalker forced Gaalan backward , Khai arrived on the scene . Taking advantage of the distraction she provided , Gaalan fled in his shuttle , leaving the Jedi to take Khai captive . As the Skywalkers left Dathomir with Khai , however , they were confronted by eleven ChaseMaster frigates under the command of the Sith High Lord Sarasu Taalon . Taalon proposed that they form an alliance in order to bring down Abeloth , a powerful dark side being , and the Jedi accepted the offer . Prelude . In 43 . 5 ABY , a strike team sent by the Lost Tribe of Sith from the planet Kesh hunted down the exiled Jedi Grand Master Luke Skywalker with the intent of killing him , in order to pave the way for their intended invasion of the galaxy . However , when the strike team attacked Skywalker — who was with his son , Ben , at a space station in the Maw — the entire team was killed , except for the Sith apprentice Vestara Khai , who fled the station in a space yacht . The Skywalkers tracked Khai to the planet Dathomir , hoping to learn the homeworld of her Sith Order . However , when they located her planetside , they discovered that she was already under the protection of the Raining Leaves Clan , a group of Dathomiri Witches . On Dathomir , Khai had sent a hypercomm message to the Lost Tribe , calling for them to retrieve her . They sent a team of Sith under the command of Lord Viun Gaalan to pick up Khai and a group of Nightsisters — darksider s whom Khai believed could be converted into Sith . After the Sith captured the Nightsisters , Khai went to retrieve one more of their number , Halliava Vurse , whom Khai had left in the forest . Gaalan , along with three Sith Saber s , remained behind in the landing meadow to wait for Khai while the rest of the Sith delivered the captured Nightsisters to their orbiting armada . Meanwhile , the Skywalkers — along with the Force - sensitive Dyon Stadd — had been pursuing Khai , and they eventually tracked her to the meadow , where they found Gaalan and the three Sith Sabers . The duel . Gaalan greeted the Jedi and claimed that he was going to kill the elder Skywalker in revenge for the death of Olaris Rhea , who had led the strike team that had been sent to Sinkhole Station . Gaalan then ignited his lightsaber , and the Skywalkers and the three other Sith did likewise . Gaalan and Luke Skywalker instantly engaged in a duel , and one of the Sith Sabers , Gaalan ' s aide , attempted to assist the Sith Lord , but Skywalker forced her away . Ben Skywalker , meanwhile , rushed toward one of the other Sith Sabers . The young Skywalker suddenly switched directions , however , and the Sith was caught off - balance and dropped his lightsaber . Stadd then shot the Sith four times with his twin blaster pistols , killing him . As another Sith Saber attacked Stadd and cut through one of his blasters , Gaalan ' s aide began dueling with Ben Skywalker . Meanwhile , Gaalan used a series of intricate and refined blows in an attempt to overwhelm the elder Skywalker , but the Jedi countered his attacks and slowly began to force him back . Stadd , however , was overmatched by his opponent , and was forced to use a series of evasive maneuvers to escape the Sith Saber ' s attacks . Stadd then feinted as if to dive for the dead Sith ' s lightsaber while actually just grabbing a handful of dirt , and came up apparently empty - handed . As the Sith Saber moved in , Stadd threw the dirt into the face of Ben ' s opponent — Gaalan ' s aide . She was caught off - guard , and Ben Skywalker quickly cleaved her in two at the waist before moving to attack the third Sith Saber . Meanwhile , Khai had noticed the duel and used the Force to sprint toward the skirmish , hoping to arrive in time to assist her comrades . However , Stadd fired on the last surviving Saber , who deflected the shot toward the young Skywalker , who in turn deflected it back at the Saber . The bolt hit her wrist , and as she staggered back , Stadd shot her in the gut and Skywalker decapitated her simultaneously . Khai finally arrived on the scene , and as the Jedi adjusted to her presence in preparation to confront her , Gaalan took advantage of the distraction to leap back into his shuttle and flee . The elder Skywalker attempted to use the Force to pull the shuttle back down , but Gaalan countered his power and escaped to the Sith fleet . Aftermath . Stadd and the Skywalkers confronted Khai , taking her captive , and Stadd took the lightsaber of the first Sith Saber he had killed and decided to keep it . Members of the Bright Sun Clan — the clan that had formed when the Raining Leaves Clan had combined with the all - male Broken Columns Clan a short time previously — arrived and captured Vurse in the forest , where Khai had left her before returning to the landing meadow . As Vurse was convicted by the Bright Sun Clan for her actions against them and officially exposed as a Nightsister , the Clan also allowed the Jedi to take custody of Khai , claiming that — as she had betrayed their trust by conspiring with Nightsisters — she was no longer a member of the Clan . The Skywalkers then left with Khai in the Jedi ' s ship , the " Jade Shadow " , but as they approached orbit , they were met by eleven capital - class ChaseMaster frigates of the Sith fleet . The commander of the fleet , High Lord Sarasu Taalon , ordered that the Skywalkers enter a parking orbit and seeing no alternative , the Jedi obeyed . However , to their surprise , the Sith offered to form an alliance with the Jedi in an attempt to defeat Abeloth , a mysterious dark side being whom the Jedi had encountered while in a realm of the Force called beyond shadows , and whom they suspected was the cause of a psychosis that plagued several Knights in the Jedi Order . The Skywalkers were skeptical at first , but eventually accepted the proposal . The alliance was a ploy , however , as the Sith intended to force Abeloth to join them . Behind the scenes . This duel first appeared in " " , Aaron Allston ' s second installment in the " " series and the fourth novel overall in the series .