Laman's Legacy - Dark before Dawn

[Wayfarer]

"We are ready?"

 

Getting a nod from his compatriots, Aventari nodded and looked at the back of the tent they had managed to all wind their way to.  Taking circuitous routes through the Aiel camp, the trio had plied their trades as gleemen to make their way.  Being one of the few sorts of Wetlanders, as they called people of the Westlands, that the would allow in their camp it had been a necessary and indeed invaluable disguise they had slipped into.  Gleemen were welcome just about everywhere in the camp, except for a few sensitive places where no Wetlander was allowed.

 

Usually.

 

As much as the Aiel were wary, and there was no doubt of that, in the heart of their own encampment they had never once had a cause for fear.  Beyond the reach of their hated enemies, the Treekillers, the Sons of Cairhien, the Rogues Guild, safe from those who plagued them during the night within the city.  After all, what did they have to fear of thieves and cutthroats?  Murderers who would never face them in a fair fight, that did not possess the spine or the courage to stand against their spears?

 

Aventari had heard enough of such talk around the fires ever since he had been in the camp, and he had to admit to himself that he felt a great joy within that he was going to destroy their sense of security.  Much like they had destroyed the certainty of the city he held dear, the knowledge that they were safe from oppression save for that of their own lords and ladies.  It was by no means perfect, but it was better than arbitrary killings in the streets by a bloodthirsty race, as if they were so justified in their actions.

 

This late at night there were few wandering about, now was the time to make their move while they had some hours before the dawn.  Walking away from Aran and Talon, Aventari uncorked a skin of oosquai and poured some on himself as he stumbled forward.  Even as he walked around the tent, he could hear low voices, but those were of no concern as he bobbed and weaved, passing the tent with the skin in one hand and a guitar in the other with the latter dragging along the ground.

 

Hearing one of the guards by the tent flap ask what he was doing, Aventari looked with a grin and held up the oosquai skin only for it to drop out of his hand.  Falling back on his arse as he giggled, the Aiel guards were muttering even as he pulled the guitar into his lap.  The act was more than enough, if there was one thing above all else Aventari had learned while in the camp it was that Aiel felt that Wetlanders couldn't hold their oosquai.  The pair of Aiel were oblivious to the shadows other than their own that were behind them.

 

It was over within a moment, quick knives on the part of his companions silenced the guards and he was on his feet with his guitar and oosquai skin forgotten.  Padding over to the tent flap, he could make out the voices.  Lord Alneau was answering some woman, a questioner, maybe a maiden?  It wouldn't really matter, not as Aventari signalled to his companions.  It was the most basic tactics that were best sometimes, in this case surprise and speed.

 

The tent flaps parted and Aventari was only two steps before he launched himself at the Aiel woman he saw before him.  His fist connecting with her throat, the pair went down in a heap but even as the woman tried to get her voice back, tried to breath, Aventari quickly grabbed her jaw and twisted with a viciousness that left her head dangling at a sickening angle.  Aran had some gai'shain on the ground with his hand on her mouth and his dagger poised to strike while Talon had come through the tent only to find there was no one that needed his attention.

 

What is Aran doing?  Aventari noticed that Aran hadn't killed the gai'shain already.  "Whats wrong?"

 

"She isn't Aiel, look."

 

As Aran turned the woman's face towards Aventari so he could see, Lord Alneau spoke up.  "She's one of us, they took her away and brought her back like that.  I don't know why they put her in gai'shain robes but they didn't take anyone else away.  That woman was one of their Wise Ones, our questioner until dawn when another would take over and another until they got what they wanted, sleep deprivation."

 

Looking at Lord Alneau, Aventari nodded then gestured for Aran to let her go.  Even as Aran quickly got off and helped her to her feet and went to free the others, Aventari took the chance to speak while Talon dragged in the pair of guards and the other bits of evidence outside.  "We're getting you out.  Stay together, stay quiet, along the way we'll get you some disguises and slip through their lines back to Cairhien.  Do what you're told at all times, we didn't decide to take this risk to have our throats slit for our trouble."

 

Looking to Talon who had just brought in the oosquai skin and guitar, Aventari pointed at him.  "I want you with these people, make sure they stay together."  Turning to Aran, Aventari nodded at him.  "We will take the lead.  Same as before, knives only when necessary."  Getting an answering nod, Aventari withdrew a simple letter from his jacket and dropped it on the dead Wise One before leading the way out with his brother at his side.

 

 

Aventari

Rogues Guild Leader

 

OOC: Rogues and Sons of Cairhein on this thread only first of all :).  This happens during the same time as the Darkness & Shadows thread, specifically about midnight a little after when Cor sent Alianna away, and well before the dawn service that happened a number of hours later.  Not sure if this was the best place to end it, but I figured it gave a chance for people to put reactions and stuff in.  If you don't want to, just PM me and if no one wants to use the lull, I'll take it forward further.

[Guest Estel]

Crouched little more than a foot away from the other captives, she still longed to be closer; so somehow feel less alone in the low tent.  She could have just moved the two steps that would bring her into the middle of the Cairhienin but the physical proximity wouldn’t help so she kept her self-induced isolation.  Unlike after attacking Cor, Alianna had no doubts she made the right decision but it didn’t change the fact that she hated feeling so separate from the others in the tent.  All of this was hard enough without being so along.  Cor hated her and they certainly would too after they learned what she had done in the other tent for the Aiel to mark her out in the white cloak now covering her otherwise naked body.  Only it hadn’t been the Aiel who marked her out.  She had done that herself.

 

There was no talking.  Only silence.  Light how she hated that silence.  Any time any of the others tried to whisper they’d get a soft-skinned boot to their ribs.  If they wanted to waste their air, the Aiel were going to dictate when and how.  Alianna wished they would talk; wished she could join in.  But would even that bridge the gap she had willingly crossed?

 

One moment the captives were eyeing the Aiel woman, Wise One Alianna had learned they were called, and then all of a sudden the bejewelled Aiel was dead and Alianna had a knife to her throat and a man was holding her down.

 

So they knew she was gai’shain.  Apparently they didn’t know why.  That was all to the better as far as Ali was concerned but how long could she keep it hidden?  And what would they do when they found out she had turned her cloak again?

 

And who in the Light’s name were the two strange men?

 

That was answered, but their intentions became clear.  Rescue?  That was sort of counter-productive.   At least on Ali’s part.  She wanted to stay.  She needed to stay.

 

“I’m not leaving.”

[Sam]

Talon hid his disappointment well. Aventari and Jester moved with great efficiency, and when he had entered the tent, all hope of his participating in anything interesting fled. Then again, last into the tent also raised his life expectancy considerably. A finger strayed to the hilt of his dagger. Its cool metal would drink deep its fill of life soon enough. Patience.

 

Talon believed the taking of gai’shain to be a strange custom. In the environment of his youth, failure frequently meant a swift termination, or at least the desire for one. It was common sense. The Great Lord drew his share of servants suffering from paraphilias and fetishes for … unique experiences. While openly it was encouraged, the abhorrent practices seldom prelated “results”, and as everyone knew, heavy baggage only weighed a man down.

 

The Aiel were considered one of the most intimidating martial forces to ever exist, and Talon would not deny that they were difficult to overcome if one chose to fight by honourable rules of warfare, which naturally Talon did not. But their ji’e’toh defied logic more than a Domani virgin and he doubted he would ever comprehend the deeper meanings. Noble savages?—Whatever.

 

Babysitting detail, excellent! His chances of survival just quadrupled, not only would he have Jest and Aventari to hide behind, but his own herd of cattle. Sometimes the Great Lord treated him too kindly. This would be the simplest operation he had eve—what? She wasn’t going? Oh, The Great Lord treated him far too kindly.

 

The corners of his mouth twitched in pleasure, even as his fist connected with the white robed westlander, who folded like the white sheet she was wearing. He did not mean to have hit her that hard … okay, maybe just a little. He hoisted her over his shoulder and raised his eyebrow in question, “Anyone else ‘not leaving’?”

 

Amazing how quickly a person could obey when given the right incentive.

 

[TaeaDawn]

It took everything in her to pay attention to the words that Lord Alneau spoke to their questioner.  He wasn't giving anything away but there was always the chance that something small would slip, something that she might need to try to cover for later, but details were fading as weariness made her mind a fog.  Movement came and with it her attention sharpened, but it wasn't until she heard his voice that the fog was lifted and exhaustion was replaced by clarity supplied by adrenaline.  Twice in her life she had been kidnapped and now it seemed she had the same person to thank for her release from both. She didn't have time even to catch his eye before he was gone.  Had he even seen her there?  She didn't know but she would find him later and thank him properly. 

 

So she had high expectations from the man that Aran left to protect them that were dashed almost as soon as Aran left the tent.  She wanted to let into the man for his treatment of the other woman but now was not the time and place.  She didn't understand the Aiel and didn't have any idea why they had marked this one woman out among them all as a... gaishan?  The other woman wanted to stay though and that said something to Raina.  She didn't belong in Cairhein so leave her to the savages she wanted to be with.  It was something to take up at a later time though.  She didn't doubt the man would treat her as rough no matter her standing.  Nor would it change their position in things.  Fighting with him not about it would only end in a rough hand and a delay in their release. 

 

Though it irked her to have to give way to such a rough creature, she had to trust that Aran had left them in the hands of someone that would see them out.  Light, Aran had saved her from men determined to harm her Grand Aunt, now this.  If she didn't start making smarter decisions she was going to owe his her first born.  A slight smile crossed her lips at the thought of Aran with a brat of hers in tow with a scowling 'auntie ara' by his side. 

 

She shook her head, realizing that she was still firmly in exhaustion's grip.  She had to keep her head now.  She made eye contact with Alneau and nodded.  He was at the back of the group, taking the rear guard within those that had been made hostage.  Raina moved to the side of this creature that Aran had left to tend to them.

 

The Lady Raina Dulcei :P

[Wayfarer]

As far as Aran was concerned, it had only been their years of experience that had allowed them to slip away from the Aiel Camp without raising an alarm.  Then again, it was the one who was on the offensive who had the advantage.  Someone could post as many guards as they wanted, but it was the one who snuck in and out that could act freely as long as they remained undetected, numbers meant nothing at that point.  Even the Aiel had weaknesses that could be exploited once they were observed for long enough, and when the morning came they would realise how vulnerable they really were, when it was too late.

 

They'd reached Cairhien proper a good ten minutes ago, the gates opening for them the moment that the guardsmen had heard Lord Reynard Alneau's voice.  A good deal of the guard had sided silently with the Sons of Cairhien even though they had not acted, simply turned a blind eye.  The news they had been taken had destroyed morale, and their return had sent spirits soaring again as it spread across the walls. 

 

It was then that three of their charges had left them, Jean accompanying Aventari and Talon to take care of matters with the Guild while Reynard and Raina with their cohorts took care of their own preparations.  There was too much that had to be taken care of, too much relying on their actions and so little time.  They would have to see to as many people being evacuated from the city as possible while making sure that word did not escape to the Aiel.  They would do what they can, the Wheel would weave their threads as it would.

 

Shifting the burden over his shoulder, Aran had been happy to take the burden from Talon.  He'd understood why the man had acted so when it was explained, why she would have reacted so was unknown, but he doubted that she wanted to wake up to the man looming over her.  No, it was to him to take her somewhere that she could be held securely until they could work out what to do about her.  More importantly, learn her story, for she had been hauled away from the others and returned in the whites that she wore now.

 

But then, that was why he was on the way to the Alneau townhouse now.  Once he'd delivered the woman into the custody of the Alneau, then he could help in the preparations for the morning that approached.  They would make the Aiel bleed, they would repay those who hated them with blades and fire and they would not rest until no Aiel breathed Cairhienin air...

[Guest Estel]

kaBOOM!  kaBOOM!  kaBOOM!  kaBOOM!

 

Alianna groaned, rubbed her temples, rubbed her eyes and then attempted to open them.  Mistake!  Even the minimal light flickering around the room from a lit candle blinded her and seemed to encourage the excruciating thumping concentrated around the right side of her head.  Last she had known anything of her surroundings, it had been a great deal less comfortable.  The feather mattress and soft quilt under her were better than she had had back in Chachin and a far cry better than the fare she had been sleeping on lately.  However, while the former Theifcatcher certainly wasn’t complaining about the conditions she seemed to have inexplicably found herself in, it certainly meant she was no longer in the Aiel camp.

 

‘So it appears my “rescuers” were not about to take “no” for an answer.’

 

She groaned, rubbed her temples and then rubbed her eyes again before squinting against the light.  Only thing she managed to see at first was the white ceiling and judging by the lighting, there as a window nearby, it was definitely still night.  ‘How long have I been unconscious?  ...I got punched?’  The realisation dawned on her and she gently stroked her fingers along the right side of her face; she found a nasty sized lump protruding from her cheekbone, just under her temple.

 

“Blood and—AH!!”  Light, she hoped her jaw hadn’t taken any serious damage!  Even if the bastard hadn’t broken her jaw, though, it was still going to be bloody painful to talk for a good long while—a good while longer than that if he had.  Even wincing brought tears to her eyes, moving any facial muscles at caused an excruciating burn from the right side of her face.  Bastard!  Of course, the blinding pain from her cheek just wasn’t enough to make her completely miserable so her migraine had to flare up every time she moved as well.

 

Alianna Karalev was not at all happy.

 

However, stupid obstinacy and rage toward her “rescuers”, who had suddenly turned kidnappers, kept her from simply curling up in a ball and revelling in her misery.  One hand shading her eyes from the aggravating light, the other pushed her from the bed and onto her feet.  Ali lurched towards the window, keeping herself upright only by leaning heavily on the ledge.

 

Judging by the moon, already hanging just over the roofs of the other houses, low in the western sky, it was somewhere near dawn.  The street looked onto an empty street, seemingly filled with a great deal of other townhouses like this one.  She was on the second floor but there seemed to be enough of a lip between the first and second floors that she could step onto from the window and after that, there was another window on the first floor that she should be able to reach if she dangled herself off the ledge.  It was not going to be an easy climb.  On the bright side, she was only on the second floor and while landing on the cobblestones below would be painful, hopefully she would only break a leg, not her neck.  Of course, climbing in a cumbersome white cloak was less than ideal, not to mention the brilliant view she would be allowing anyone who happened to walk beneath her, but while it would be much easier to simply leave the damned thing here, it was difficult to remain inconspicuous in the nude.

 

She opened the window, which was a far more painful procedure than it sounds as every movement caused twofold pain in both injured cheekbone and throbbing brain, and sat on the ledge, back towards the street.  This afforded her a splendid view of the rest of the room and the company whom decided to join her, thus preventing her little escape attempt.

 

“Mother’s mi—AHH!”  Honestly, was the Creator playing jokes?  If this pain kept up, she’d leave Cairhien with a much cleaner vocabulary.  Of course, that would only happen if the damn man caught her before teetering on the ledge became tumbling out the window.

[Wayfarer]

Grasping the woman's cadin'sor, Luc Alneau didn't hesitate as he yanked on it as hard as he could, pulling the woman away from the window and onto the floor.  Alianna Karalev, that was her name, and for some reason she had been dressed in the Aiel servant clothes when she had been brought in.  Passing by her room to head out, he'd heard someone opening the window and to find she was trying to escape?  What was going on?

 

She didn't seem to take too kindly to being pulled away from the window either, but Luc seized the first flailing arm and simply twisted it until the woman was forced face first to the floor.  There he held her until her protests and struggles dimmed and she calmed herself, which was a surprising considering the how klonked she had been when she had first been brought in by one of the Rogues.

 

Releasing her and stepping away, it was a moment before the woman turned about to face him.  It was the first real good look he had of her as well, she looked like she was at least a decade older than him.  A couple of hints of grey in her near black hair and a couple of scars on her left cheek, she looked like she had been through a bit.  She was meant to once be a thiefcatcher after all, strange that she had fallen in with who she had, but stranger still she wore the clothes that she did.

 

Also odd was her height, she would have been taller than most Cairhienin men let alone the women, yet was still shorter than him by at least half a foot.  He didn't bother wasting time with pretty words but got straight to the point with a clear Cairhienin accent.

 

"What do you think you're doing?  You just got hauled out of the Aiel camp, were brought here unconscious because I hear you almost got everyone discovered by the sentries, and now you're trying to escape?  I don't suppose you have a particularly good explanation for that?  Or why you're wearing their rags?"

 

 

Luc Alneau

Scion of House Alneau

[Guest Estel]

One moment it was the cobblestones two stories down that she was staring at, the next, a polished wooden floor.  Her cheek and face had been smashed to the ground, a heavy weight on her back kept her from rising and her arm was twisted painfully behind her while the other flailed blindly in an attempt to find something other than the floor and herself to hit.  Ali’s cheek throbbed with excruciating pain after being smashed to the floor, so much that her eyes watered, threatening to send tears down her cheeks and betray weakness to her... enemy?—friend?  Who was holding her down?

 

Eventually she stopped flailing her arm and the weight on her back disappeared; she was released but didn’t rise until she was in control of herself and the pain.  When Alianna did stand and face her... captor?, it was a pair of icy blue eyes and a face she had only glimpsed from afar at the meeting with her fellow—could she still call them fellows when she couldn’t really call herself a captive any longer?  And was this man her enemy?  He fought for the “other side”, but in the beginning that had been “her side” too and now she did not fight for the Aiel, rather she served one of them as payment for a debt.  So, technically, she was no longer involved in this war—right?  But wasn’t she a captive again?

 

“Why aren’t you wearing their rags?”  Blood and ashes, talking hurt!  The less talking the better, but if she didn’t explain she wasn’t fighting against them, why would they let her go?  “I wasn’t brought here of my own free will, and if you’d be so kind as to—Blood and...”  For a moment, she simply stood gently holding onto her bruised jaw as if to soothe it better.  Unfortunately, this was no knot in her back or headache that she could massage away.

 

Holding up a finger in the universal sign for “shut up and wait a minute, I’ll continue in a second”, Ali groaned a muttered unintelligible curses without moving her jaw.  She finally continued when most of the pain has subsided.  “If you’d let me go on my way, that would be much appreciated.”

[Wayfarer]

"I don't wear the garb of murderers and savages."  The flat tone was one that came easily to Luc when his lineage was ever made a topic.  It was one thing to speak of it with his grandfather, or the family retainers, but not to someone beyond them.  Just because he had their height, their hair and their eyes, it did not mean he had their bloodlust and savagery.  He would not be them, he was Cairhienin in heart and mind.  "And no, you are not allowed to leave.  It seems they were right, you've given over to them.  You'll not be free to go to them and tell of the escape and who aided."

 

“You may not wear their “rags”, but it’s your own blood that you’re spilling.”  The much taller, stronger and uninjured man gave her a dark look that reminded Ali that she was shorter, weaker and her cheekbone was aching so bad she had half a mind to just cut it off and be done with it.  Perhaps goading him wasn’t such a good idea.  “I wouldn’t have had anything to tell if you’d just let me stay.”  Damnit...now she was pouting.

 

"Instead you would have raised an alarm, or if you'd kept silent they would have blamed you and said you were part of it, fool woman."  Luc was less than impressed by the pout, but then he wasn't impressed much to begin with.  Collaboraters and those who bent knee to the Aiel were a disgrace.  It was no different to bending knee to a Trolloc, they reaved and ravaged their way through the lands of their neighbours with lies and self righteous to try and justify it.  "And they are not mine.  I am Cairhienin, not a barbarian."

 

“Everything about you says differently.” she couldn’t help it.  The man was so indoctrinated and blind that he didn’t see the culture, nor even any scrap of humanity in the relatives he was so intent on hating.  “You hate them just as much as they hate you, but while they try to keep the peace in your own damn—” another break to let her jaw rest “—city, you work to disturb it!  How many of your own countrymen will die because you couldn’t bend your pride and obvious hate—” he tried to speak but she cut him off savagely with a slashing moment from her hand; she was not done her rant yet “—enough to let everybody just go about their lives.  You’re no bloody better than they are."

 

“But that’s not why I’m here and why I’m wearing these.” Ali gestured to her garb savagely as if trying to protect her decision with the violence with which she moved.  “I became Gai’shain to repay a debt, not to be the tool of either nation.”

 

"Peace?"  Luc barked a short laugh, it wasn't pretty.  "The only peace they bring is on the end of their spears for those who do not bend to their law.  We have our own laws, or own ways, yet it is their spears that walk the streets and strike down our own without justice.  It is not just to slay a thief when you can catch him.  The practice of the Amadicians with taking the hands of thieves is barbaric and all know it for that, yet the Aiel kill people for the same crime on our streets and you say that we should just live our lives, blind to this?  Maybe its because you are a foreigner that you are so blind to it, it is so easy for you avert your eyes and simply say that everything would be well if we all gave up who we are, if we just ignore that those who hate us hold the power of life and death over us.  You know nothing."

 

“Nothing do I-AAAH!”  Mother’s milk in a flaming cup!  She was going to kill the man who hit her when she found him.  “How are you any different if you’re killing them?  They kill you, you kill them.  Where’s the difference?  Only more of you are dying!  And besides, it is a hopeless cause!  There is an Aiel for every two Cairhien.  Half of those Aiel are siswai’aman, trained warriors and among the best the world has to offer.  How many trained warriors do you have, bastard of Alneau?  A thousand or two trained retainers who’ve seen nothing street brawls and training lathes, a rabble of assassins and murderers and walk-ins who’ve seen a dozen bar fights who don’t know one end of their sword from the other.  What else do you do with the thieves you catch except throw them in jail and then kill them?”

 

She paused again, glaring and impatiently waiting for her jaw to stop driving nails into her skull.  “I was a thiefcatcher before all this started, boy.” Ali emphasised the derogatory to try and make him see his stupidity.  “I don’t agree with killing off those good-for-nothings in the Foregate, but all of you are self-righteous idiots killing the murderers!  I’m not here to fight, I’m here to pay my debt and get on with my life!  If you keep this pointless war up, boy, you’ll have no life to get on with.”

 

Luc was both quiet and still as the woman finished speaking.  He would not let his tongue run loose on him, he would choose his words with care instead.  This woman was a foreigner, she did not understand and didn't want to.  When he chose to break his silence, he did so quietly.  "There is no life left to live if it is not our own.  Our people live in fear every day that the Aiel spears may turn on them, and rightly so.  You seek to excuse their hatred with our own, but we did not invade their lands.  We did not raze their settlements, we did not rape their women, we did not turn against those that we had once called friend."

 

"They did.  Our King cut down a tree, yet it was his people who suffered for it.  They ravaged our nation, once perhaps the most powerful of the Westlands, its most trusted allies marched on their lands and destroyed and pillaged all before them.  My grandfather lost every single one of his children and his wife in the first war, including my mother when I was born."

 

Taking a moment to catch the emotion that threatened to surface at the thought of his mother, and how he had been conceived and how it was his birth that had killed her, he continued.  "The Aiel not once spoke of why they were there.  They simply killed, and they killed in Tear and in Andor and finally at Shining Walls they got what they wanted and left as they had come, fat on the blood they had spilt.  That is their justice.  Now they come a second time, they chased off the Shaido but then took the city for themselves, and they took their fifth from everyone.  Not just from those of wealth, but also from those who had but meager means.  That was after the Aiel had killed every child of my grandfather's second wife, my uncles yet they were like brothers."

 

"Nearly everyone in my family for the past three generations has been murdered by Aiel, my grandfather and myself are all that are left.  They might have claim to being great fighters, but their hands aren't only stained with the blood of soldiers.  They kill innocents with as much ease, of course, if the innocent dies because of a fire they set instead of on their spear, thats different, isn't it?  Light, even the thieves and cutthroats of our city resist them and were the first to do so.  The scum of our society, the lowest of the low, those who should have been the first to turn coward and run from the city, go elsewhere to ply their trades.  Yet they stayed, they took up arms against some of the finest fighters known, and you don't question why even they will fight?"

 

Normally Luc's gaze was easy going, but now his eyes were like hard sapphires.  "The Aiel walk our streets and there is no life left for us if we do not reclaim Cairhien for ourselves.  To live under the threat of the Aiel spear is to not live, and I will not desert my people and flee and just leave them to the mercy of the Aiel while they murder more of ours in our own streets.  They will not do so freely, those of us that can will challenge them at every turn and fight, and fight, and fight until our people can call their home theirs or until the last of us who fight are dead.  That is our commitment, maybe you don't understand that being a foreign thiefcatcher who drifts from place to place, but this is my home and I can still fight for it and for those who have died."

[Guest Estel]

Alianna sighed in frustration.  Would neither side see!  How could either believe the unreal inhumanity both saw from the other side?  If she could just take all of them and make them live with the others, make them watch Cairhienin mothers cry and beg their sons not to leave for this suicide war or watch Aiel children tearfully hug their fathers for what could be the last time.  If the siswai’aman could stand with the grieving over the unmarked, mass graves of penniless poor who could afford no better for their beloved sons; if the Sons of Cairhien and Rogues Guild could only listen to the death songs of the mourning Aiel and watch tears fall down faces made of steel—maybe then this would all stop!

 

The Cairhienin would be slaughtered; the Thiefcatcher knew this with a certainty.  She had seen villages after they had been razed by Trollocs, Shadowspan left nothing!  It was horrible to see burnt embers poking out of the ground like some corrupted field from the Dark One’s own hell.  But who was worse off, those who died in Trolloc cookpots, or the few left behind for whom everything they had ever known or loved, all they had put their life’s energy and focus into, all of it was suddenly and painfully ripped from them.  Alianna could identify with every grieving parent, every fatherless child, every widowed wife; even now the thiefcatcher felt herself staring into the black abyss that was everything she loved and knew. 

 

Her family, they had taken her family away!  Why couldn’t he see!  He had lost his own family hadn’t he!  How could he wish that amount of pain on anyone else!  Had it been so long since he had grieved that he had nothing but anger and vengeance left?  Could he forget that he was doing the same to someone else’s nephew, someone else’s brother, someone else’s mother? 

 

Light, she was getting far too worked up about this.  She was a foreigner, why should she care what happened to a bunch of Southerners who’d never seen the Blight and didn’t know real suffering.  They played at their pathetic Daes Dae’mar, a poor substitute for the danger and action of the Blightborder.  Knives in the dark, poison, assassins, duels, rapes, adultery; a thousand kinds of power plays and ethic wars where everything was complicated and cast in shades of grey.  Send both armies to battle back the Blight!  A useful outlet for their pent up rage and lust for blood!  Let them dull their swords and spears on Trollocs who had no children and Myrdraal whose only father was evil incarnate!  Would they be so quick to return to their stupid, bloody cycle of revenge after they stood against massive armies of Shadowspan, twenty to one?  Would a few Aiel walking Cairhien’s streets matter so much when they saw Trollocs raiding entire villages?  Light blast the heathens!  They’d bloody flaming thank the Aiel for letting them walk free and praise the Aiel for killing their enemies!  Likewise the Aiel would give each murderer a sword and let him ply his bloody trade in the Blight where his death would mean something!

 

All of this ran through her head as he went on and on, justifying his stupid waste of lives.  With every passing minute her anger and frustration multiplied until every muscle in her body was tense and her jaw pounded just outside conscious thought.  When he finished, she simply let it all go with a crescendoing roar.

 

“You think you know what it’s like to lose your entire family, boy?  Have you ever stood at the edge of crater the size of the entire city of Cairhien and realised that everything and everyone you ever knew, your entire family had not only died, but their very existence was wiped from the face of the earth and the only person who even remembered them was you?  And you can do nothing for them because the enemy who killed them is so much bigger than just one person or just one nation.  You can kill a hundred Aiel and say “this is for my family” and you hurt the Aiel nation, the nation that killed your family.  But you can’t just kill a hundred Shadowspan and say “this is for Chachin” because one hundred Shadowspan doesn’t amount to even a tenth of the people wiped off the face of the earth with the crater!  And do you think the Dark One himself gives a damn about whether or not you killed a hundred Shadowspan?  No one cares about Shadwspan, not even the spawn that bred them!  There is no avenging yourself against the Shadow!  Revenge is insatiable!  You can push the Aiel out of Cairhien and kill half of Cairhien in the process but even if all of Kandor, all of the Borderlands took up sword and charged into the Blight nothing would be achieved.

 

“What is more important to you, boy?  The fate of your beloved city or the fate of the whole bloody damn world!  Makes you petty revenge seem small?

 

“You talk about your people living in fear!  Go live on the Blightborder!  When the Aiel leave here, your city will still stand for the most part, they kill murderers and thieves, they exact their own justice on your people, they rape your women, kill your sons, take your possessions, and you compare them to Trollocs.  Have you ever seen a Trolloc?  Have you ever seen what’s really left after Trollocs reave a village?  They make the Aiel seem like friendly neighbours!  Trollocs leave nothing!  You won’t have to worry about whether or not you can govern yourselves, you won’t be alive to care!

 

“And you dare speak of justice or the reasons the Aiel came?  The Aiel saved you from the Shaido, keeping the people they hated safe.  There is no hate so bitter as the hate after a friend’s betrayal.  You betrayed them and wonder why they came down on you like rain from the clouds?  It’s just common sense not to anger a force so much larger than you.  But what is any of that when the Trollocs give no justification for raiding villages; they plunder and kill as they please with no conscience to guide them!

 

“You know nothing about revenge, boy!  You know nothing of hell!  You know nothing about losing your family or facing a force thousands of times bigger than you are!  You know nothing about anything!”

 

She was finally done.

 

Breathing heavily, as if she had just run around the entire Aiel camp, Alianna didn’t even notice the tears leaking from her eyes from the extreme pain in her jaw.  During the entire rant, she hadn’t stopped once and now that her rage no longer distracted her from the pain, it was enough to make her sway and nearly lost consciousness.

[Wayfarer]

Barely catching the woman around the waist in time as she swayed from the effort, Luc bit his tongue rather than rage at her.  There was no point, it wasn't her he hated and it wasn't her fault that she didn't understand, could never understand.  Scooping the woman's legs up with his other arm, at least they weren't far from the bed.  Taking the few necessary steps to reach it, Luc laid her down gently so her head was propped up by the pillows.  It was a difficult transition to see her as someone who had collaborated and bent knee to someone who was simply ignorant and didn't understand because her own country was in ruins, but it made it easier to see her.  Fool woman.

 

Allowing her the chance to recover her wits, Luc waited until she was lucid and his inner turmoil had calmed before he spoke.  "That is all you have to say?  That your own pain is greater than anyone elses so we Cairhienin should just set aside our swords and just let the Aiel kill us one by one because we aren't as wounded as you?  Because we don't have Shadowspawn on our borders, we just aren't noble like your people, that we're misguided, that the crimes committed against us are somehow less because they were committed by men instead of trollocs?"

 

"The crimes are all the worse for it.  Shadowspawn can't help what they are, evil as they are that is just what they are.  Aiel are human, or at least look like it, they have a choice in what they do and that is what they chose.  And while you can say they saved us from the Shaido, they chased the Shaido into our lands to begin with and the only reason they didn't finish what the Shaido started is because the Dragon ordered them to.  When our lords spoke against the Aiel here, the Dragon refused to listen and he will not listen because he is not here."

 

"We never acceded to the Aiel presence, we were forced to it.  They are not our friends and they haven't been for nearly a quarter of a century since they butchered our people over a tree.  After the First Aiel War, we never went after them seeking revenge, our people rebuilt their lives as best they could only to have it ruined once more.  You would have us do the same thing twice?  No.  We will not live on the whim of those who hate us, we will either live as Cairhienin or die us such, not as thralls to our enemies."

 

Reaching for the glass of water that had been left for the woman, Luc handed it to her as he added.  "But this talk is pointless, it will all be over soon.  The day shall see this fight settled once and for all."