Home sweet home, eh?

[Sam]

The woman dozed beside the hearth. She had the appearance of one young, yet capable. Her light complexion, incarnadined by the warmth;  short black hair curled in ringlets around her forehead; one hand draped across her lap, the other resting flat on the table, each covered by a soft-leather glove.  Recumbent, on ought to be forgiven for believing her incapable of those sins that stained her hands: stained redder than calefaction.

 

A cool glass of ale and a warm fire, the two necessary ingredients for any celebration and this was, even disguised, one selfsame occasion. Emelia had dressed herself up nicely and relaxed in the warm tavern for most of the afternoon. She was very proud of her simple, but elegant taste, and she had paid well for it ... others, had paid well for it.

 

The wilder had returned from her latest mercenary excursion wealthier than ever before, and most importantly, no lives had been lost. Several had escaped with varying degrees of burns, but none had died.  This was not her cause for celebration, for in sooth she cared very little one way or the other. Nor was the excursion her cause for celebration, nor her fashion, nor her coin. No. This was the same spot in which she had last encountered Sera.

 

Celebration may have been too strong a word, for there was no mirth in the remembrance. The dispatching of Sera had been necessary for her own survival; there was no malice in the action. If any emotion could be indicated it would, perhaps, be one of regret. The same part of her that enjoyed the flames had also enjoyed the thrill of being hunted, and that part had not wanted it to end.

 

That final meeting between them had been replayed in her mind many times since, but none were more poignant than this, the one she experience now sitting in the very same spot. If only she had not brought those other two with her, if only she had been more reasonable, none of it would have happened, and Emelia would not have been forced to drive the blade into the warm flesh of Sera's body....

 

Her smooth face contracted briefly at the brow, the only outward show of nostalgic pangs. Sera had been unique, and the closest thing Emelia had known to a friend. Some may have considered this thought with repulsion and shame, but Emelia thought no more of it than her walking every day in her life, only to turn and find her shadow missing.

 

"Beeiy you a drrink?" The voice was slurred and masculine: the lout from across the way, no doubt.

 

"Go away." Her responding tone was rich and vibrant, plucked cords from a harp, belying her torpid demeanour.

 

"Aww comme on girrlee. Jusht one?"

 

"No, thanks all the same."

 

"Now look her—" whatever comment he had been about to make turned into a squawk of surprise and mild pain. His side of the table had suddenly become inexplicably hot. Emelia's small teeth flashed with mirth in the hearth-light as the man quickly retreated. She did not even bother to open her eyes.

 

 

 

The one drawback to her newfound freedom to go anywhere in the world, unseen and unremarked, leaving title and ring and shawl behind so nobody would recognise her … was that sometimes nobody recognised her.

 

Firstly she had been sent to the back of a queue. She, the most powerful woman in the world, had been instructed to queue like a nobody! Possibly she should not have ignored the line in the first place, but she had never had patience for the social courtesies, and it had never occurred to her that a harassed stranger might send her right back again. She had managed not to refuse, though her brows had shot up and she had had to bite her tongue, but the indignity and boredom of waiting in a queue had reduced her to plotting everybody's demise in icy silence. Of course she had left her ring and seven-striped shawl behind, and dressed like a merchant, and resolved not to use the One Power save in the direst of circumstances, but she hadn't quite realised that somebody might actually be fooled. Did nobody even recognise an Aes Sedai in this Light-forsaken town?

 

Secondly, when she had finally reached the front and asked for her contact, the girl at the desk had looked her up and down and suggested that perhaps somebody else would be more appropriate. It took a fair amount of forbearance not to inform the wretch that while she might not look rich, the Tower gave generously, she had a good touch with money and in short she could buy out an old banking house twice over, not that it was any of the girl's business anyway; instead Sirayn leaned on the counter, transfixed her victim with a stare borrowed from a basilisk, and repeated her request. Quietly. And even then she had to wait ten minutes in a side room until her contact consented to see her. The fact that as soon as her contact recognised her the other woman went white, shut the door and begged her forgiveness provided some much-needed compensation.

 

Thirdly a clutch of little children had noticed her hand, or lack of it, whereupon a minor diplomatic incident had only just been averted. Let them stare had sounded like a good policy in Tar Valon, where nobody dared, but it had definite flaws

 

Anyway, she had mostly recovered from the numerous indignities of masquerading as a nobody, at least enough to marvel over the treatment less important people had to put up with all the time. Honestly, why they tolerated it she didn't know; if she had to deal with queues, exasperation and barely concealed disdain on a daily basis she would have left a trail of carnage behind her unmatched by one-handed midgets throughout history.

 

Anonymous she might be but she had left only her title and shawl behind when she stepped out of that gateway. The feel of another woman channelling not ten feet away startled her so much she nearly jumped out of her skin. Icy fear crept into her. Dreadlord: the word beat a rapid pulse in her thoughts … she had never been a match for a Dreadlord, she had met too many and learned to dread them all, and alone but for an angreal in some backwater town … she bit her tongue on a heartfelt curse. She hadn't touched the True Source; maybe the other woman hadn't noticed her. She could run.

 

She could always bloody run. Dreadlords made a coward out of her and she hated it. Cursing her stupid, stupid inability to walk away from a fight -- not to mention how it grew in direct proportion to how much the previous one had scared her -- Sirayn embraced the One Power, pushed open the tavern door and stalked inside.

 

 

 

The pother wound, wreathing her senses with a film of narcotic. Her vision tarnished, dropping away; her hearing lost its colour; her hands tingled with a loss of sensation. Responsively, muscles relaxed and Emelia sank back into her chair, eyes closed, mind leaving footsteps in the sands of time.

 

She saw in her mind their last meeting: Sera and her companions sitting opposite, refusing to eat or drink that which Emelia had provided them. The indignation and wounded pride had burned her cheeks, how easily she had flown into a rage! Every movement came back to her, every subtle shift of weight, every breath; the painful chill of the doused hearth and how the half-light had played sinister upon Sera's features. Emelia had been afraid.

 

The aromas of the market place had mixed with the sea of humanity to infuse her with excitation. She remembered reaching out with gloved hand to tease, only to be forced back into hiding; unwilling to lose the game. She had been so angry with Sera's companions, for they had spoiled everything. It was they who had placed black murder within her breast....

 

...Her heart. The rise and fall of her chest. Flesh yielding to pressure. The sudden rousing of flames that screamed for attention.  The delicate grip upon her knife hand, the only physical contact the two had truly made.  The vacating stare as Emelia lowered her to the ground, Sera's vision piercing the veil of mortality.

 

The haze of chemicals was joined by the air distortion of gathering heat and two pinpricks of light—pupils—blazed with an inner fire.

 

Emelia smiled when she felt the embracing of saidar from without the ale house. Sera, just as she had come so long ago. She opened bleary eyes to spot the approaching silhouette, slightly out of focus and overlapping at the edges. Her teeth flashed in welcome and her hands unconsciously smoothed her hair and straightened her clothing.

 

"Sera! Come. Come, do sit down," a vague gesture, "ale, wine, water?" The last word was stressed in what Emelia considered a comedic fashion. Why did Sera never laugh? Oh, she wished she would laugh.

 

The silhouette opposite seemed lost in thought, perhaps she had spoken, perhaps not. Emelia found herself struggling to concentrate. The seller of dreams had told this particular dream would help her relax. She would pay him a visit tomorrow, perhaps, to discuss definitions of "relaxed." She thought perhaps there had been a headshake to the negative, so she did not signal to be attended.

 

"What is the matter Sera, are you troubled? I have missed you!" Emelia spoke with unashamed enthusiasm at the return of one whose thread she had believed severed. The shadow did not respond. Perhaps Sera was still angry about that. Always was the type to hold a grudge.  Maybe she would apologise, or explain. No, something was different. Something was wrong.

 

Her picture of the half-concealed-by-darkness silhouette began to sharpen, and what she saw was a face she did not recognize, someone alien and unknown. Those were not the hands she had touch ... there was one hand only, Sera had had two! Who was that, and where was Sera, her Sera?

 

Emelia's disconnected mind began to realise the grave error. The fire in her eyes was fevered, and the air became alive....