The Grey Tower

The Oncoming Storm This fanfic follows the last chapter of the fanfic What Comes After. Featuring Lysira Walker Gaidar (the heroine), Jerid Walker Asha'man (the damsel in distress), and Zae Rowe Sedai of the Indigo Ajah (the surprise). Guest appearances by Seira Ji'Dar, Sojin Majere Gaidin, Gareth Tomosan Asha'man of the Yellow Ajah, and Soldier Morgan Cade.

Act One: The Oncoming Storm Lysira knew the moment Jerid veiled their bond. It would have been noticed no matter when it happened, but with how things had been for her husband lately… Well, she was living on edge and was hyper-aware of anything to do with him. At another time, it might not have been as great a cause for concern as it was then. Now, however, it put her to the edge of panic.

Why would he hide himself from her? What was he doing?

She knew him too well to suspect it wasn’t something dangerous. He had been unraveling and she’d been able to do nothing but watch. Increasingly, day by day, there was more and more wrong, and he was all but broken; fractured into a million pieces of the man she loved, scattered over their shared existence.

When he veiled the bond, she cried out inwardly. The darkness shivered around the edges of her awareness, where it woke from an all too short slumber. The diminutive Gaidar took off at a dead run, abandoning the class she had been teaching. She knew her students would be confused and she’d make her apologies to them and Riahana later, but all trainees were ingrained with the knowledge that your bondmate was the most important thing.

Only her child was more important, but she knew him safe. Cade’s father was another matter.

Unable to peer through the veil, she couldn’t use the bond to track him so she just headed into the Tower proper to begin with.  When she skidded to a halt, letting her eyes adjust to the lighting indoor instead of the sun outside, she forced her breathing and heartbeat to regulate. Her black eyes flickered everywhere, calling upon a sense within her that did not rely on the bond itself.

Don’t do this to me, my love. She refused to let her tears of frustration rise to life, but she couldn’t embrace the Void as it eluded her.

Following she knew not what, but trusted, she started walking. The corridors around her were barely seen, not in any sort of reality, but as familiar paths her feet followed in a dance to the rhythm of her own heart beating. It beat in time to another’s.

Lysira almost stumbled when the veil fell away with such suddenness, it felt like it was torn. Her awareness of him was returned with violence, but now she had more than just the vague sense of where he was. She realized that she had been walking the right way, and now she sprinted away again. She rushed to the very bowels of the Tower.

Memories assaulted her. She had been here before. In fact, more than once, but the heightened emotions that attended her this time reminded her of another most...emotional occasion.

An arrow into the Fiery Serpent. Straight through where his heart would have been, if he had one.

She felt like an arrow was through her heart now. That knot of awareness in her mind was raw, more so than it had been in all the weeks before it. Like a ball filled with lightning that shot out into her brain. Something was even worse than she had suspected when he first masked the bond, and she forced herself faster.

This time, she didn’t have her bow. That hadn’t been the training she was in the midst of when she felt the bond masked, but she had her sword as well as knives in her boots.

As the bond grew closer, it also grew weaker. She knew he was injured, badly. The Void slipped even further past her fingertips as fear gripped her. The darkness felt its opening and tried to move in, but her need to focus on moving forward kept it away. If there had been anyone to see her running, they might have said that she ran like the Dark One himself was biting her heels and in a sense, they would be right.

Don’t do this to me… Whether she was speaking to Jerid or just the Creator, no one could know--not even her.

The darkness reared up like a tidal wave behind her as she burst silently into the dark space. Her keen eyes instantly counted the three figures looming over the body prone on the ground that she instantly knew for her Asha’man. The ferocity with which her protective instincts flared was only slightly less than when her son was threatened, but it gripped her tight.

Caution was not known as she rushed forward. They didn’t see her coming as she dropped her center of gravity just as she was in reach of the closest figure, a woman whose knee was the recipient of Lysira’s boot heel. There was a cracking sound as she fell backward with a strangled sound, her head bouncing off the stone floor.

Lys turned quickly to face the others. Two men. One was nearly brought off his feet by the disoriented woman, but the other was focused on her as she surged to her feet.

He lifted his hand and held it towards her. Instantly, she felt the shifting in her mind and knew that something was happening. She had felt it before. What this man did not realize was that all control she had over the darkness was removed by his mental meddling. She felt it surge through her and if she had been incautious and full of bloodlust before…

Violently, she fought against the swirling in her mind until the darkness shattered it. The guttural roar that would’ve emerged from any other never came from her, but she banged her head forward as if breaking through a little block. The man’s eyes widened and she drank in his fear, running at him. Her boot pushed off his knee and then the other off his thigh before her own legs wrapped around his neck. She flung all of her body weight back without care for where her head went, only lifting her arms to grip the floor as she forcibly lifted him off his feet and smacked him down to the floor. Coming back around, she gained her feet again but only for a moment before she lunged and pressed her knees to his back. Her little fingers gripped his hair and banged his face, again and again, into the stone floor.

She probably would’ve continued until his skull was shards, but someone grabbed her from behind. The arms were thick and masculine, but with no other forces, she knew him for a Gaidin and that was all the darkness wanted to know.

Hauling her back off the now-dead channeler, she was upright again when his fist slammed into her back and very nearly drove into her kidney. Her breath rushed out, almost like a hoarse noise that harkened back to a moment of her youth when the Fiery Serpent--Lucan’s predecessor--had chained her to the table and used the One Power to manipulate her lungs and vocal chords to make something like a voice.

It was not a good memory, the darkness sank deeper.

Nothing mattered. He was bigger than her and one arm around her throat could hold her off the ground, but she didn’t care. The pain radiated through her back, but she didn’t care. She thrust her elbow behind her, connecting--if at a slightly awkward angle--with his face. While he recovered from that, she lifted her legs like she was sitting and then threw them forward. It was enough to throw him off balance, put her feet to the ground and send him flying over her head.

He recovered quickly, being a Warder of the Yards, and rushed at her again like a bull. She skipped back a few steps, grinning like a fiend, before she crossed her arm across her body to grab his forward hand--her right to his right. Using his momentum against him, she spun. Her back collided with his chest and she elbowed him twice in quick succession--face and chest--and felt a spray of warm liquid on her head from his broken nose.

If only she could taste it.

He didn’t let her know and got his arm around her neck. Instantly, it was hard enough to cut into her air supply. Black dots swam before her eyes and she felt blood vessels breaking under her skin. The darkness made her awareness heightened like the Void could, but removed the ability to matter with more skill than the Void ever could. She fed off the pain, even the lack of air as the darkness melded with it to levels of almost sexual satisfaction. She let out her silent growl as she kicked back.

A cracking sound came from his knee and his arm around her neck loosened. She again sent her elbow flying backward, connecting with his gut to drive all his air from his lungs. The arm loosened further, letting her grab his wrist and yank it straight so she could drive her fist up into his elbow. She was against rewarded with that musical cracking noise.

As she let him fall away behind her, she looked around and saw that everything swayed. Breath came difficulty and the world around her would not stop.

Before she had a chance to recover either breath or vision, a barrel of Air slammed into her stomach and pushed her feet out from under her. She went flying downward, slamming her face into the stone. Her nose cracked and her lip split, flooding her mouth with the taste of her own hot blood. She swallowed and lifted her head, watching the woman--still looking unsteady--approach her with sword in hand and malice in eye.

Lysira smiled with her bloody teeth. As soon as the woman was close, Lysira lashed out with one hand and pulled herself forward. Her teeth sank through the fabric of her dress, anchoring in her leg so hard that even through the cloth, she broke the skin and blood soaked through. The woman shrieked and against fell on her arse, just like the first time.

She should have stayed there.

Scrambling forward, she crawled over the woman and straddled her waist. Linking her fists, she swung the pair in hard hits until she was sure the woman was dead.

Lysira rose unsteadily. The world still swam and reality seemed like a distant cousin to her present existence. The darkness reveled in the blood on her lips and she wanted to lick her fingers, but someone yet lived. She stalked toward the Gaidin who, with broken elbow and knee, could do little at her approach. Her hand brushed her sword and she drew it. He tried to bat it away but she kicked at his hand, knocked it back, and then drove her sword through him until the tip hit the floor and she twisted it.

With her enemies dead, the darkness sought its next victim…

...but it was someone else’s victim it found.

Jerid. His name in her thoughts and the sight of his broken body drove the shadows forcibly from her mind. She threw herself to her knees beside him, and that’s when the pain flooded into her and she would have collapsed entirely from her own wounds if she did not have the need to see to him. Every breath hurt, but she forced herself to seek the bond.

He was not dead. He had not died while she fought…

She took his face in her bloody hands. Are you there?

Jerid lay unmoving as the scene unfolded around him. Everything he saw was as if through a haze.

In his mind, he could feel that hurricane of emotion and pure adrenaline coursing through the bond he shared with Lysira.

And then that dark wave of bloodlust, lust and desire to inflict harm. A part of him shuddered at the new sensation. To call it unpleasant was to say a Fade's eyeless stare was merely unpleasing.

Every bone in his body cried for him to pick himself up and offer some sort of aide. But aside from his body twitching and a few croaks of his voice, he was unable to move.

His body was on fire. The poison of the knife that she had stabbed him with was already acting quickly. He convulsed and felt blood rise through his throat. He began to choke and through sheer force of will managed to turn to his side and spit it out.

Then … the demon's call that was saidin, brutal and so savage with fire and ice, yet a constant companion that one could relish in wielding, was suddenly there once more. The slim barrier between him and the One Power was gone.

He tried to reach for it, prayed to the Creator that it could give him some edge to help his Warder.

Despite the darkness and adrenaline pumping through Lysira, Jerid was very keenly aware of the toll her attack on these …. figures had on these figures. She might not feel it, it seemed, but that didn't mean her body wasn't susceptible to the damage she was receiving.

But saidin eluded him. Where invisible fingers might normally and gracefully wield with refined devastation, it slipped from him as if his hands were smeared with butter.

So he lay, unmoving, watching … even as the world began to slip bit by bit from his sight.

The last thing he saw before he succumbed to the darkness was Lysira’s bloodied face. Despite the blood and bruises, she was still the most beautiful creature he’d ever seen. He wanted to reach up to her, but his arms refused to respond.

“I ... “ was the only thing he could say before the world fell from beneath his feet and he slipped into unconsciousness.

Light, her agonized mind cried out. How was she going to get him out of here? Looking around swiftly, she knew that everyone else was dead so there was at least no threat. The only hope she could think of was to run and gain aid, but how fast could she go like this...and would she lose him before she even got there?

Act Two: Eye of the Storm Help came from a very unlikely, or perhaps likely, source.

“What in bloody…” It was the Ji’dar, Seira. Of course, she had been in the Warder Yards because Lysira was teaching, but hadn’t been able to keep up with the diminutive warder with fire on her tail. The girl--who was no girl, really--surveyed the scene swiftly and then rushed to Lysira’s side.

Bigger than Lysira, but not by that much, she would at least provide some aid. Lysira’s hands hurt so badly she didn’t think she could even sign, but that seemed unnecessary. “We have to move him,” Seira stated the obvious and then rolled her eyes at herself for doing so. “Can you...move?”

Lysira nodded. If it killed her, she would.

Together, the women--only by some miracle of the hand of the creator--managed to move the First Seeker up from the dank bowels of the Grey Tower. By the time they reached corridors where life teemed again, they were besieged by the living--including Sojin Majere, who had been in the Yards and seen his step-mother (how strange that was) tear off and could only guess where she’d gone.
Sojin had been training his own group of trainees, running them through the Tower corridors on a run along with another Gaidin, when he saw the First Seeker's Warder bolt past them like a wolf chasing a Trolloc carrying away a first-born pup.

He frowned slightly and quickly instructed the other Warder to take charge, knowing this could only mean trouble.

The silver-haired Gaidin, dressed only in training clothes and armed with only his jian sword, quickly followed in pursuit of Lysira Gaidar. Only, she was nowhere to be found. It was as if the Creator itself had possessed her, pointed her in the direction of Shayol Ghul and said she could blow the evil place up with but a glance.

Based on the expression on her face when he caught but a glimpse, Sojin didn't doubt she could do that. The woman was one of the fiercest women alive that he knew.

And so he wandered and waited … and then he caught sight of a pair of women pulling up a bloodied man who might as well have been a corpse. One of the women, Lysira, looked just as in bad a shape as the man, who looked like his father.

“Bloody flaming fool,” he said, a bit too loudly. The first Asha'man that looked at him sideways was also his first conscripted volunteer.

“Asha'man, please inform the Infirmary that it has two patients on its way,” the silver-haired Gaidin said politely, if a little too sharply.

Between the group, Lysira was relieved of the weight but clung to them despite all her injuries all the way to the infirmary, hovering like the Phantom of Vengeance should they not Heal him...but luck was on their side in this as Gareth Asha’man, one of the Tower’s best Healers and student of the inimitable Aden Cole, was on duty, as was Thea Sedai, once bond-mate to the Amyrlin’s first son and a good Healer in her own right.

While Thea tried to get Lysira’s cooperation to be Healed, and the Gaidar would not leave her bond’s side, Gareth instantly set upon Jerid, wondering how many times he’d have to purge poison from this man’s blood…

Upon entry to the Infirmary, the First Seeker was immediately beset by whom Sojin understood was one of the Tower's finest Healers, and bonded to Riahana Gaidar.

He grabbed a nearby Yellow Aes Sedai, Aeryn Sedai, one he knew from his and Miahala Sedai's foray into Saldaea. “Please take your Warder and some others and investigate the bowels of the Tower. I want to know what happened. I will join you as soon as I am able.”

The Yellow looked at the Gaidin, toward Jerid Walker and then nodded firmly before departing.

His sapphire eyes fell on Lysira's bloodied visage and her reluctance to submit to Thea Sedai's tender touch. The military captain in him almost barked out orders, for her to go under the Healing process.

The Warder in him, and a man who lost a family once, knew better. He placed a hand on Lysira's shoulder and whispered, “Lysira, you do no one any good by refusing Healing, least of all your Asha'man husband. If you go on as you are now, Warder bond or no, you'll collapse, and what will that do to him?”

His eyes watched as Gareth Asha'man immediately began whatever it was channelers did. Of course, one of his first thoughts was that Miahala was going to kill her First Seeker should he survive … well maim him, maybe something unimportant, like an ear.

The silver-haired Gaidin watched as his father's body suddenly convulsed and jolted. He saw the Indigo's hands clench as tightly as his jaw. Those gold-flecked green eyes opened all of two seconds, as if scanning the room before he fell back into unconsciousness.

Sojin moved to observe from a better standpoint and noticed the wounds healing. Knife wounds, precisely placed to inflict a great amount of damage without killing the First Seeker outright. The man would have died slowly, if not for whatever poison surely entered his system.

The word filtered into Lysira’s hazy mind as a hard-fought battle. Eventually, she relented and let Thea tend to her. ‘Please, not far,’ she signed. Seira, still close by, translated. Thea met her eyes and then nodded, moving her just to a cot nearby and set to work.

When he saw the Yellow finished, the immediate concern was whether to keep him in the Infirmary or return him to Lysira and Jerid's apartments.

Sojin was among the first to speak. “His apartments. If a threat wants to slip into that area, then they would have to get past whatever Wards, surprises and a Warder to get to the First Seeker,” Sojin murmured. His mind was in the Void, without emotion, only logic. He'd rather take a practical approach to this now, and then claim his father's hide for his saddle later for what was surely a stupid stunt of his own making.

In a word, the Indigo Asha’man has been a mess...in more ways than one. Gareth’s hasty but efficient Delving weave showed him all--including some suspicious signs that would need discussion later--but for now, there were other things to be done. The torrent of saidin raged through him, constrained and forced into the Healing weaves--purging poison, repair internal damage and then external.

When he was done, he leaned back and let out a long breath. Healing of that complexity was only rarely called on during the day to day, and it had taken some effort.

The large Asha’man looked at the Gaidin, son of the First Seeker, and nodded. “It will be safer until we know what happened in the first place,” he agreed, his voice rumbling like mountains colliding and sliding. He glanced back where Lysira Gaidar was being treated, looking better although the dried blood remained on her face as she finally pushed Thea off and returned to her bondmate’s side.

Lifting her head, she looked at Sojin. ‘My son?’

Sojin looked at Lysira and inclined his head.

“Young Master Cade is safe, Gaidar,” Sojin murmured. “There are two Asha'man watching him and I was informed that Sebrina Calin Gaidar requested another two of the Green Ajah to join them, and their five Warders between them.”

Before Lysira could respond, he raised a hand in assurance. “Brina is a capable Warder, and she served as the captain of House Walker's armsmen when I was sitting in that flaming seat,” he said simply. His eyes went to his father. “She's also the sister of Sienna Calin, the Gaidar who once was bonded to your Asha'man. In Brina's hands, I place all trust, and she will die and take out half the Black Ajah before she allows anyone to harm a charge of hers.”

The diminutive Gaidar was worn too ragged to argue. She trusted Sojin, and so she trusted his judgement on who would keep her son safe while she kept his father safe...soon to have to be kept safe from her. The flaming idiot… She sighed as she looked down at his unconscious form and then back up at Sojin, then Gareth. ‘I would like him moved to our rooms as soon as possible,’ she signed, dutifully translated by Seira. The feeling she’d gotten often as a young woman on her own was returned: she distrusted open spaces, and even the infirmary counted as one.

She wanted him in their rooms, which she deemed safe--better for her to guard and be guarded.

“He is Healed,” Gareth joined the conversation in his low tones, taking a cup of tea from Thea to help recover from his exertions before seeing to the rest of his day in the infirmary. Nothing short of being mauled by Trollocs would make him cut his duty short. “He can be moved, but will need plenty of rest and food when we wakes.”

Sojin nodded at Lysira's request, not needing her translator's interpretations. He noted the young Ji'dar briefly. She appeared vaguely familiar but Sojin had never seen her in his own training regiment.

Oddly enough, he didn't trust the Ji'dar. He couldn't place his finger on it, but there was something off.

When Gareth Asha'man prescribed that the First Seeker was Healed, Sojin bowed slightly in respect and murmured, “Thank you, Asha'man. I'll see to the security of the route back to the apartments.”

He looked at Lysira and added, “And I assure you, Gaidar, that after he's been brought back that location, I will be joining the investigation.” His sapphire eyes danced with an absolute resolution. He was going hunting and the Dark One itself would not stand in the way of finding his father's would-be assassin.

She looked at the Gaidar and then at her translator. “With your blessing, Gaidar, I would ask Ji'dar Seira accompany me on the investigation since she knows the scene, however limited.” Sojin murmured. He might not feel trusting of the young woman, but at the moment his options were limited.

“I will have Jerid Asha'man's aide, Soldier Morgan Walker, assigned to your antechambers to receive food and water and any messages,” Sojin added.

Lysira looked over Jerid’s face for a long moment, sighing before she turned back to Sojin and nodded. ‘Thank you,’ she signed simply.

Act Three: The Second Storm Front, or Shadows Revealed Zae walked somewhat hurriedly down the corridor, her indigo skirts lifted slightly as she just short of ran through her Ajah's halls.

Word had spread like wildfire throughout the Indigo Hall that Jerid Walker was nearly killed and now lie in recovery. Needless to say, when word came to Zae Rowe Aes Sedai of the Indigo Ajah, the Novice that informed her was nearly run over in the Aes Sedai's attempt to leave.

That flaming fool, was the only thought that entered his mind. Of course, she had known about the plan. And the conditions that she agreed to should he die. She only prayed that Lysira Gaidar didn't hear about them or the Indigo Ajah would be the small Warder's next target.

She wore only a simple amethyst necklace around her neck, her blue-green eyes were fret with worry and the small knife at her side appeared only ceremonial in nature. She reached the First Seeker's apartments and knocked quite fiercely.

When the door opened and she saw a familiar Solider, Morgan Cade, she frowned. The boy might Jerid's aide, but he was no match for the Aes Sedai's tenacity or determination.

Morgan, his mist-colored eyes considering for one moment whether to deny admission or step out of the way, did the latter almost on instinct. A lifelong thief, he might be keen to survive, but at this particular moment, he was more afraid of the Gaidar in the private quarters beyond him than an angry, albeit influential, Aes Sedai.

Unfortunately, it was not his choice.

“I would see him NOW[/i],” she roared at the Soldier.

The normally polite Zae Sedai showed the confidence and skill she had grown into over the decades and bowled past the Soldier without a second thought.

All Morgan could do was announce very loudly, “Gaidar Lysira, Zae Rowe Aes Sedai to see you and Jerid Asha'man.”

That statement alone earned a burning look from Zae and immediately assumed authority. “Soldier Morgan Cade, to the Master of Soldiers office with you. Inform him that I have asked you be sent to clean the Library's privies for the next month.”

Morgan moved to protest, but one glare sent him out the door, but only after Lysira Gaidar emerged into the antechamber. He looked at her once in askance, and the when the diminutive Warder nodded, he was out the door.

Zae's eyes landed on the Warder and they softened. “How is he,” she asked. Then her eyes hardened. “Because if he's well, I want to smash his skull in and beat him with a rod for his stupidity.”

It had been a few hours since Sojin had overseen Jerid’s body to their rooms. Lysira had word sent to Cade, but asked him to stay in the library a while. She wanted him kept in place with his own guards and let her focus on Jerid for the time being. In that time, she’d cleaned the blood off him as well as his bloody clothes and now let him gain the rest he needed.

Then she’d cleaned herself as well. She changed into her own clean clothing, dressed more casually than when she worked in the Yards, but she kept herself armed. She trusted no one at that moment. Not until they knew more about what had happened down in those lower levels that had led to all of this. Jerid couldn’t yet tell her, so she just had to wait.

The appearance of Zae was not really a surprise, although her agitated manner was. Aes Sedai were usually better about hiding such things. The Gaidar’s onyx black eyes flickered over the woman, feeling ill at ease with the attitude. The darkness shivered, and that made her even more uneasy.

‘He will live,’ she signed, feeling the need for subtlety. ‘And if someone were to be granted the right to thrash him, it would be me, Aes Sedai.’ She ‘spoke’ with respect, but would not allow anyone--not even if it was Miahala or the M’hael or Riahana themselves--to trample upon her place as his warder-wife. ‘For now, he rests.’

Zae frowned slightly at the small Gaidar's silent words. She could simply remove her from the picture with a weave and get to her desired goal to see her Ajah Head.

But she instead bowed her head in deference. “I would have been the same way with my husband Alec Asha'man,” she murmured in understanding. “If he were still alive and had pulled the same stupid stunt, I would have dismembered even the M'Hael for trying to punish him before I had my chance.”

Zae's eyes filled briefly with the pain of such a loss. Alec had died so many years ago when Jerid Walker led a small army of channelers to rescue a First Sitter of the Green Ajah from a circle of thirteen Aes Sedai and Fades. She had never questioned the decision to save an en'Damier's life, but still felt the pain and loss.

“He told me he was going to meet an informant regarding the death of his daughter,” Zae murmured. “I insisted he take you, but … you know him, so flaming … idiotic at times.”

Her blue-green eyes spoke with fondness for the man, one born of sheer loyalty. The Gaidar was likely to know that, aside from Balen Ashe Asha'man, Zae was Jerid's most loyal friend.

And the days in which he slipped further and further into grief, especially after Balen's death on top of that of his daughter Bryn, Zae had managed the affairs of the Ajah as best she could to give him time to grieve.

“With your blessing, Gaidar, I would see the First Seeker,” she murmured. “I will not harm him, but I would like to Delve him. I understand Gareth Asha'man Healed him, but … I want to ensure he's well before I tell the Sitters to go sit on a spear before they move to question his state of mind to serve.”

Lysira’s first instinct was to say no, but she couldn’t figure out why that was...and she couldn’t come up with a good reason to deny her. She told herself she was just being overprotective, although she also told herself she had every right to be. She knew what the fellow Indigo meant to her husband, however, and she forced herself to calm down.

She stepped back and gestured to the room. Her look was blank, because otherwise it would be one of disapproval.

Zae inclined her head in thanks and walked into the private quarters beyond the antechamber of the First Seeker's apartments.

Saidar flowed through her like a sweet song, and she drew in as much as was safe. She was strong, but not near as strong as the First Seeker, or nowhere near the match of the Amyrlin Seat. But she was skilled in her own way, including the art of Healing.

In the dim light, Zae could see Jerid lying on the bed, covered. The Indigo Asha'man still looked imposing even in slumber. His skin was pale, however, the signs of a recent Healing. She'd seen that look a few times on the Indigo Asha'man, after coming back from a bout with a Dreadlord when he was Keeper of the Archives.

The man was nothing, if not determined, to protect what he saw as his Tower and his family.

The Indigo Aes Sedai was aware that Lysira followed closely behind, watching her like a hawk. She was taller than the other woman, but size never mattered to Zae. It was the sheer tenacity and strength of will that mattered. After all, an Aiel Warrior near seven feet tall stood little chance against a Wise One a good foot shorter that the man.

Zae approached the bed, laid a hand on the still sleeping Jerid Walker, and Delved him quite effectively. The weave yielded no traces of any wounds or poisons reported in the man and she seemed slightly relieved at the result.

“He will be well,” she murmured softly. A slender hand touched his face briefly.

“He seems so calm and peaceful now, perhaps more so than since his daughter died,” Zae murmured. She had arrived with a group of channelers shortly after the event happened, only to find Jerid holding his dead daughter in his arms.

“I often wondered whether he thought of that moment when the knife came,” she murmured.

The word “knife” cut into Lysira just like what it described. How did she know? Jerid was free of injury and neither the Yellows nor the warders who aided would have revealed what they knew… Lysira’s body tensed, the darkness sank closer--too close already--and she made to move in...

She was aware of the Warder's sudden tensing, but Zae was faster. She hesitate as she smashed her elbow down into the Gaidar's nose. There was an audible crunch even as she turned and wove threads of Air that savagely flung the Warder back against the far wall. The weaves were firmly in place as she looked at the Warder.

She considered crushing her where she stood, like she did with the Dreadlords responsible for killing her husband so long ago. But then Jerid groaned and shuddered, as if the impact of Lysira's injuries were felt across the bond.

She could’ve screamed. The Gaidar had faced down three in the basement and now held in place… Well, by betrayal. Sometimes that was the most powerful weapon. Lysira struggled against the Air, spitting blood onto the floor from where it ran from her again-broken nose into her mouth. When Jerid groaned, her eyes flickered to him… She fought again. I must do something!

Zae turned slightly and sat on the bed, tenderly touching Jerid's face.

“He should have been mine,” she murmured. “I would have followed him into Pit of Dhoom itself and back, and renounced my loyalty to the Great Lord. I thought … after the Portal Stone cut the bond that tied him to you … even before when his eyes started to wander ...”
She leaned down to kiss Jerid on the lips with a soft passion. “You showed me every kindness, arranged for the best Aes Sedai to train me, introduced me to Alec,” she murmured. “And after … Light, I would have been willing. But you chose that … White Catieri al'Cardyn instead. You took her as your lover, a weak-willed channeler of little strength and she bore you a son.”

She gripped his hair into one hand, tears rolling down her cheek. She yanked, as if considering to smash his skull against the pillow in hope that it would be crushed.

“And then you vanish in fire, only to show up a decade later,” she murmured. Zae looked back at Lysira. “He destroyed a nest of Dreadlords in old Hama Valon, after you left. And he vanished for ten years, while most thought him dead. And then, he pops up again, as if coming back from a short jaunt.”

Her eyes fell back on the pale Indigo First Seeker. “I suggested a bond with him, suggested something more, and then … he rejected it. Said he could never accept another bond again … and then he bonds that Murandian Sienna Calin because Liana en'Damier told him to for the sake of common decency,” she murmured. “You took her with you to the Caralain, took her into your bed. Because of that, she had to die.”

She shifted her blue-green eyes back to the trapped Gaidar. “That was probably the first act I took against him, but I felt guilty. He was thought dead and I knew better. There were rumblings among the Friends of the Dark, and among some of the Chosen. I sent someone to investigate, with the order to kill the Warder.”

Tears formed at her eyes, almost as if ashamed of the order. She wiped them away with one hand. “Part of me felt some form of joy, to know he went through the same feeling I did when I lost Alec. But I hoped for more.”

Again she looked at the Gaidar before turning back to Jerid. “Do you know what it's like when you're a young woman, with all your goals in sight, all to have everything turned upside down when he comes crashing into your world?” Zae asked quietly. “He inspires courage, inspires you[/i] to be better than what you thought possible, only to have him break your heart time and again?”

Her eyes again shifted to Lysira. Zae stood up and walked until she was mere inches from the pinned Gaidar.

“And then there's you,” Zae said, her blue-green eyes filled with hate. “He loves you, he will always love you. The defective Warder whom the Freak of the Yards took pity on when she was but a girl and only rose to her rank because she was good with a bow and because she would be nothing else.”

She smiled grimly. “He told me just the other day that all he could see when he looked into the future was you. He went alone to the bottom of the Tower because he didn't want to risk you being implicated in case he found out the Chosen that ordered the death of his daughter was a Sitter or a member of the Tower's leadership. He even arranged to have the bond transferred to me should he die because he didn't want you to become mad.”

Zae spat on the Gaidar and murmured, “It's because of you, the fact that he bonded you a second time, that his daughter is dead. If I lost something precious, then so would he. Attacking you was too obvious, your weakling son's demise or that of Sojin Majere would have ignited a crusade, but Bryn … the bastard daughter was so much like him. It was for her that he was willing to give up everything, to become a simple Asha'man and father, to be … more.”

There was no pleasure in her voice as she spoke, only pain and guilt. “Send an order to my cell and they bring in others. Bryn is killed and Jerid is traumatized. I waited, planted certain seeds of information and … well, make him think he was crazy,” she said. “Balen unfortunately found out too much and he needed to die. Perhaps my biggest regret was that I didn't have him taken to Shayol Ghul ...”

She shrugged. And then she murmured, “I had hoped his death would bring some reflection of the lives he ruined. His first daughter Angel, Aden Cole, my husband, Balen. Me. The poison on the knife I used was supposed to kill him with that in mind. But no, you interfered. How, I don't know, but I will not fail again.”

She took a few steps back and wove a powerful Ward. It was similar to the last one she wove deep in the Tower's bowels. She spoke softly, placing the Ward between Lysira and the rest of the room.

“Let no person who speaks with reverence, respect or love of Jerid Walker Asha'man in all his names on their lips or in their Light-filled hearts pass,” she whispered.

She smiled to herself. The Ward now was a masterpiece, for she alone of her brethren loved the Asha'man. Not one person with darkness in their heart or those sworn to the Shadow had love of the First Seeker except her.

“First he will die. And then when I'm finished, I'll ensure that you and that foolish son of yours endure a slow, horrific death,” she murmured.

Zae moved back to the bed, and drew the knife at her side. Despite surface appearances, the knife held a sharp tip. She released the flows of Air holding the Gaidar, and with one look murmured, “Watch and know you can do nothing.”

The darkness battered at the edges of her awareness the entire time she was forced to sit and listen. Oh, if she could have but screamed SHUT UP! The woman was evil. She killed so many all in...this pursuit; this vendetta. Lysira didn’t need to hear about it and she fought her bonds, thinking she felt weakening in them just before she felt it relieved entirely.

Lysira’s eyes widened. Zae would think it was fear, but it wasn’t…

Again, the darkness battered, yet only bled into her mind in rivulets. Lysira’s anger was enough to hold it back, because this was...all...her.

She sprang like a wild cat, catching the Indigo on the back as she faced Jerid with the blade. Lysira drove her down, grabbing her hair to turn the woman’s head--so Lysira could see the look of shock and Zae could see Lysira’s smile.

For Lysira had never spoken any name on her lips.

Then, grip still in the Aes Sedai’s hair, she twisted--once, hard, vicious. Darkness fueled her muscles, but it was Lysira who broke that woman’s neck. As the body slumped, the diminutive Gaidar who had trained and climbed the ranks and earned everything she ever had, drew her sword and swung deftly, removing the woman’s head from her body.

Just in case.

You will never hurt my family again, she vowed in her ever-silent way. She threw the head across the room with every ounce of disrespect she could manage before she turned and crawled onto the bed, once again covered in blood and sweat, and curled up against Jerid’s unconscious side.

And wept.

Act Four: Aftermath If Jerid dreamed, he didn't recall. Somewhere deep in his slumber, all that flickered in his mind was the disturbance that rippled across the bond.

But the darkness called so cloyingly to him, like an old friend who sought to claim him fully.

He nearly acknowledged and embraced that feeling. But something held him back. The call of a voice so familiar and the pull of something so … strong.

It was a jolt of an adrenaline followed by a sharp sting of pain and sorrow that brought him from the depths, away from the siren's song of the dark.

He awoke to find something heavy lying against his chest. The world at first was blurred and he was disoriented. His mind couldn't establish a coherent thought to save his life. His head pounded and he felt a ravenous hunger unlike anything he had known … since well, the last time he had been Healed.

Why had he been Healed …

And then his eyes fell onto Lysira curled up at his side, bloodied. And all the memories of the last several hours came flooding back into his mind. He should have been dead. He was sure of it …

And then there was memory of being stabbed and … the true identity of his would-be executioner. His eyes scanned the area and … they landed on that very face … the head of Zae Rowe Sedai. Friend, confidant, fellow Indigo. And … Dreadlord.

What had happened? “Lysira,” he murmured, shaking his Warder and wife carefully.

Once he was awake and spoke to her, she swiftly turned her tear-streaked, blood-streaked face up to him with relief in her eyes. She reached up and took his face in her hands, kissing him desperately for a long moment. When she pulled back, she saw her blood on his lips and her expression showed abject apology as she wiped it off with her thumb.

Swallowing hard, she leaned back enough to show her hands. ‘I found you, near dead. I killed them all. Got you to the infirmary. Then she…’ Her eyes drifted to the head, sitting cockeyed against the leg of a chair as it stared at them blindly. ‘She came, pretending to be friend, but she slipped. She attacked me and then was going to kill you, but I killed her.’ She turned back to him, tears streaming anew. ‘My love… I thought I was going to lose you, again.’

Jerid didn't even notice the coppery taste of blood when Lysira kissed him. All he did was return the kiss as passionately as he could. It might be the last one to end in relief before she decided to kill him herself.

And then Lysira signed what could only be a very abbreviated version of events following his near-death experience.

And to think that Zae was the one behind the attack and then … to come here and try a second attempt with his Warder present was nearly unthinkable.

How could he have missed the signs? Because she was so close to you since the day you and she were Raised, he thought.

Slowly, Jerid took Lysira's face in his hands and grasped saidin. At first it was a struggle, with the balance to control the storm of fire and ice almost unlikely. But he focused on the bond and on Lysira and gained a foothold. He drew in through the jade ring angreal around his neck and quickly Delved his wife, noting the injuries she had sustained. The nose the only major one, along with some bruises suffered as if by some impact. With careful diligence, he wove the flows for the Healing weave and set the fine mesh into her. He felt cartilage and flesh mend itself until nothing remained to be Healed.

Then he released the Power, knowing better than to overexert himself.

“If my life were to be in anyone's hands, it would be yours, my heart,” he whispered. “In the darkness, I felt you coming, like a fury unknown by any I've known. And …” He paused, as if what he said next might sound insane. “Bryn was there … not an Illusion woven by her,” nodding to Zae's head, “but something reaching out … telling me to hang on.”

He released Lys's face and murmured, “She didn't happen to explain what premeditated this whole … experience, did she?”

She felt better after his touch, though cold and hungry, but couldn't care about that now. He asked, and she fought to recall all of what had been said...and then she debated if she should tell him. But no, too many secrets had been kept already.

With her reluctance obvious in her expression, she related all that Zae had said before Lysira shut her up for good.

For his part, Jerid’s attention was focused almost entirely on what Lysira conveyed to him of Zae’s final words. And if the First Seeker were upset before at the betrayal of one of his closest friends, he was livid now.

“Light,” he growled softly. “All of that because... I never knew. And she believed…”

When he had first met Lysira, all he could see was her. When he looked into the future at that point, there was nothing else. That was the case now.

A fury threatened to overwhelm him but it was quieted by the fact that Lysira was watching him. His gold-green eyes danced softly as he looked at his wife, and he knew one sticking point she might never forgive was the arrangement he had made with Zae before he had gone to the supposed rendezvous.

The death of his daughter was something he couldn’t forgive, but he had wanted to take precautions against Lysira going mad with grief in case he never returned from that meeting.

“I’m sorry,” was all he could manage.

She put her fingertips over his lips and shook her head. All that mattered to her in that moment was him, and knowing that her son was safe and guarded. The oceans of blood she had spilled this night, even if they had all been fiends, weighed on her. The darkness that floated once again around the edges of her consciousness a constant reminder of that pressure.

Lysira wanted no apologies from him, not now and maybe not ever. She knew the future remained a gaping maw of uncertainty, of what may come next, but for now, this was over.

Leaning forward, she pressed her lips to his again, closing her eyes against a new flow of tears, and just thanked the Creator for their both living to see this moment.