Hi all.
New to the forum, I think I'll add my own (cheap) speculation to the mix...
Ok, maybe it's way too cheap, but...
considering that:
1)The handmaiden seems to be the only jedi-wannabe NPC that she cares about.
2)We know Kreia was exiled by the jedi, and is supposed to have been Revan's master.
3)She was sick of the control the Force had over people. Thus, she has probably suffered some kind of loss.
4)At any given time, no more than 2 sith (a master and his apprentice) can be recognized as such.
5)The Jedi Masters say she was supposed to have died during the mandaloreans wars.
We know that Nihilus and Sion deposed her, so she wasn't probably a sith when Revan and Malak turned DS. I strongly doubt Revan had any master AFTER turning DS, so she must have taught him when he was still a jedi.
Now, during the game are mentioned some jedi that taught Revan. IIRC, these include Vrook, Vandar and Arren Kae.
Of Arren Kae, we know that she is handmaiden's mother, that she was exiled due to her realtionship with Yusanis, and followed Revan when he left to fight for the republic, dying there. IIRC, Yusanis died there as well.
Kreia seems to be the only one who knows anything about Arren Kae AT ALL. Not even the Exile, who should have known her, having fought alongside her ( I doubt a former jedi master would have passed unnoticed in the ranks of the runaway jedi... ) seems to remember anything about her.
When you talk to Kreia, and ask her why no jedi seems to notice her, she explains she's able to hide her presence when she doesn't want to be noticed.
Now, to summarize: Arren Kae, a Jedi master, falls in love with Yusanis, and gives birth to Brianna. She is exiled, and follows her former student ( Revan ) when he decides to go to war despite the council's orders. After she's lost everything, her rank, her lover, and, probably, her faith in the jedi code, she begins to walk a grey path: she feels the need to prove the jedi council that they are wrong, that the jedi code ( that exiled her) is wrong, and by "wrong" I mean "wrong" on everything, including the fact that one must live in harmony with the force, and that she was right, that if they had let her have her way, things could have been better ( Kreia herself talks the Exile along these lines if you kill the jedi masters at dantooine, or if you experience an interesting bug ( ) that occurrs when you are LS and leave her out of the party when you confront the jedi masters...). So, she begins studying the ways of the sith, as she says, not because she thinks that's the "right way" to live the force, but because, as does Atris later, she wants to fully understand the Force if she wants to confront the jedi council (Kreia says they walked the same path...) . When you talk to her, and she suggests that you train the Handmaiden in the ways of the force, she'll say something like "the jedi were there before the sith, and the force was there long before the jedi", implying that, to her, the force is neither inherently "good" nor "evil".
Her life was, anyway, really conditioned by the force, and she was sick of it. If one believes that the force is what determines his destiny, and he's not fond of his life, I guess he can decide to destroy it.
This is, IMO, what happens to Arren Kae/Kreia.
When she learns of the exile, she has her mean to show the council that they are wrong ( since the exile severed his connection to the force, and yet lives ), and "loves" him, as he represents, and has, what she's been denied: the hope of a life without from the force.
Oh, well, just my two cents anyway
