*hugglepounces* Good to see you back!

*wanders away before anyone realises she was here*

I was trying to reply to this last night when my router unexpectedly died, so sorry about the delay in my reply.

We'd love to have you back as Zoe - at the moment our numbers are pretty low in all parts of the division, so anyone coming to join us is perfectly welcome! :) If you brought back Zoe, we could even have a bit of competition in the damane showcase in the Seanchan olympics. :D

I'm obviously going to have to plug my two favourite divs (well, favourites as in first amoung equals) - the Seanchan, and the Children of the Light.

The Kids of the Light have their spiffy super secret plot coming up soon which will make for some fantastic RP opportunities, but I would really like for people to join the Seanchan and help us out. We're only small and we're easing into the bigger RPs with a Seanchan Olympics coming up - details are on our boards. Once things are a bit more organised with the systems, I'll be talking to the staff about the Return and just who we're allowed to take over and collar all of their marath'damane and take back the lands that should be ours.

So I'd encourage anyone who is interested in playing with us to get in contact with me, or to join us down on our Discussion board and see how you like things. :)

Yup, same :)

Whoo! Partay on these boards! :D

The scenery that surrounded them was becoming more and more familiar, and even after so many years in the Tower Adine was overcome with the feeling of coming home. To most Sisters, the Tower was home, but the Tower was no longer her home – could no longer be her home. The political situation filled her with disdain, and the memory of Sirayn Simeone being raised as Captain-General of the Green Ajah left the taste of bile on the back of her tongue.

She looked to Dai, as she affectionately called her Warder whenever she wasn’t in a situation that called for formality and saw him alert as ever several paces away, his slim blade bare on the saddle in front of him, one hand on the hilt. No matter what she told him, he didn’t seem to trust anyone, even though she was insistent that Two Rivers folk weren’t going to try to hurt her, and probably wouldn’t even recognise her. She’d reconciled herself to the fact that her family would be long gone, by now, but perhaps she had some nieces and nephews in the village that she could talk to. She wanted to visit Remy’s grave, and that of the rest of her family, as soon as she could, and was struck with a pang of a now long-familiar grief. She’d never quite understood how she’d come to grieve so for a husband of only three months, but there had been an unexpected affection there, that had been growing into love as he was snatched from her. She could well remember him in her arches, begging her to stay and look after the children – Jayne and Emon. She’d had another on the way, her belly starting to grow with life, which vanished the moment she stepped out of the arches. It still pained her, but she’d known that he was gone, and no matter what she wished for, that Remy would never come back. The Remy in her arches hadn’t been real, but the grief that it had reawakened certainly had been.

She realised that she’d been letting it all get to her too much when Dai rode over to her and rubbed her knee in a gesture of sympathy. There had been rumours about Adine and her Warder, but they weren’t true in the least – he was her Brother to Battle, and he treated her like a little sister not long off her mother’s apron strings whenever she let him get away with it. But they had all the relationship of brother and sister – they loved each other, but it was not a romantic love. It was a love borne for a person with whom you trusted your life, but also with whom you trusted your deepest secrets and your hidden desires. He knew all about Remy, and what had happened in the Tower, and he’d followed her willingly as he’d sworn to do when she’d grasped his face and weaved the threads for the Bond those months back. He’d have followed her to Shayol Ghul itself, he said, and while they’d spent a bit of time in the Borderlands in their wanderings, they had never gone into the Blight. Addie had spent enough time in Kaylan Morin’s rooms to know the foulness that existed in the Blight, and while she’d lent her strengths to help defend Tarwin’s Gap for a time, she’d not felt the need to go into the stronghold of the Shadow.

The whispers had reached them, though, no doubt through someone’s eyes and ears, and she’d left rather than face the questions about deserting the Tower, about deserting her Ajah. She was Green Ajah, had been raised to the Shawl and later to the Ajah after a struggle with Battleweaves and coming to grips with the fact that she was nowhere near ready to fight the Shadow. They’d forgotten that Adine knew how to work a forge, though – she knew all about tempering a blade, and they hadn’t thought of that in all their smug analogies. It was the salt water they’d used to harden her; she could still remember the sting of their remarks on the relative wounds of her rejection when she’d faced them. But regardless of leaving them, Addie was still a Green in her heart. I stand ready. She’d pledged it and she’d meant it, and she did stand ready for the Last Battle as every member of the Battle Ajah did. She just didn’t stand in the shadow of the ridiculous traditional faction within the Ajah, and she didn’t stand as a lapdog to Sirayn. The Last Battle was going to come, and the Green Ajah would not be ready, not standing as they did alone and against the Dragon Reborn. But Addie would, and had every intention of making sure that her Sisters – former Sisters, she supposed, now – did not help to break the world again in their pride and ignorance.

~~~~~

It had been some months since she’d come back to the Two Rivers, and she’d taken up residence with her nephew – who was in his sixties, and the youngest son of her younger brother. Unfortunately none of her siblings had still been alive when she’d returned, and that had pained her, but she was glad to see that all of her family had been buried together in the same stand of beech trees. She’d spent more than a few hours out there, making the short hike easily enough. The Two Rivers folk weren’t naïve enough to think her a simple noble lady anymore – things had changed, and they’d been exposed to the outside world more than she had thought possible – but she and Daishell stayed inside most of the time, only venturing out to mingle with the townsfolk on occasions. There were some black coated Asha’man in other parts of the Two Rivers, apparently, and even though she was a supporter of the Dragon Reborn, the thought of men half-mad from touching the taint was disturbing enough to keep her from Channeling unless she had to.

Her notebooks were reasonably full, though, from talking to her great-nieces and nephews, although she wondered if she could get more from the townsfolk. She was gathering old stories about wars, and knew all about Manetheren from the Tower. But as a Green, anything to do with fighting the Battle was of interest, and not everyone from the Two Rivers had been there forever. There had been those recent issues with Shadowspawn, too – how she wished she’d made it back to help out with that. Her attention was drawn to a dark shape off to one side of them, and she looked at Dai curiously, who merely shrugged. Not shadowspawn, then, but enough to make her curious.

~Adine al’Thoram Torfinn

Former Battle Sister

Bonded to Daishell Hirn

----------------------------------

Shaking her head slightly, Leila grit her teeth and leaned against a tree to allow herself to catch her breath, not smelling or hearing anything but wild animals nearby for the moment. That was good. She couldn't deal with anyone but a a friendly face right now, and wasn't wasn't sure what exactly she would do if she ran into someone who wasn't too friendly. Probably get herself killed, in worst case scenario. Perhaps they'd be so freaked out by her eyes that they'd just leave her alone, or decide that whatever she had was contagious and give her a wide birth. It wouldn't have been the first time that someone decided she was sick, and it most likely wouldn't be the last. It was easier to deal with people who thought that she was sick, anyway, and it was better than them thinking she was Shadowspawn. She'd gotten that too, of course, from her family no less. That had been long enough ago that she'd gotten over it, but it went to show that anyone could turn on her. Of course, if Leila had been in someone else's shoes and run into a woman with golden eyes, she wouldn't have been the most receptive to what they had to say either.

It had been odd enough running into Owen after she'd seen her own golden eyes. That might have been because he was an albino, though...

Shaking her head again, Leila pushed herself up and sighed, adjusting her grip on her side and wincing as her hand tugged at the gash there. It had been sheer idiocy that had gotten her into this situation in the first place, which added insult to the injury in Leila's case. She was out on one of her regular recruiting and information circuits, taking advantage of some free time to get herself out of the Stedding. After being a Watcher for however many years, she had found that it was easier for her to be outside of the Stedding than in; she felt useless in the Stedding, even though she knew that she was doing important things there too. However, outside of the Stedding she could at least deal with dangerous situations - well, she did avoid them - and feel like she was doing something by getting information. Organizing reports, while necessary, wasn't all that she'd had in mind for herself. Once she'd started wandering, she found that she couldn't stop. That was why she'd leapt at the chance to get out of the Stedding.

Unfortunately, she'd been a little careless, and her reflexes had been a little rusty. Taking a shortcut between farms, she'd stumbled into the middle of a group of young men - younger than her, but still old enough to be considered adult. They had taken one look at her golden eyes and, jumpy from the rumors of shadowspawn and Asha'men, had decided that she was from the Dark One. She wasn't especially good in close combat, though she could manage against a bunch of half trained boys long enough to get away. Her quarterstaff had been lost in the process, however, which was why she was reluctant to run into anyone else. However, she needed to get help from a healer, or a Sage, or whoever she could get it from. She'd set off in the direction of Emond's Field since she knew it was close and knew that there was a woman there who she could trust. The hard part would be getting in. That, combined with the rumors of a visiting noblewoman made her a little leery, but there was no helping it. They were just rumors, anyway, and several weeks old. The woman could have been gone by this point.

Shaking her head slightly, Leila grimaced and checked her wound again, wishing that it would stop bleeding. She thought that it wasn't as bad as it looked (in any case, none of her ribs were broken), but if she kept losing blood at this rate it would become a problem. Her constant movement probably wasn't helping either. Shaking her head and blowing some stray strands of hair out her face, Leila came to the edge of the wood and hesitated. Blood and Ashes - she was having the worst streak of luck that she'd had in a very long time. Biting her lip, she shrank back into the shadows momentarily before she realized that she'd already been seen. She was dressed in comfortable traveling clothes, but they weren't meant to blend in with the trees, or anything of that sort. Eyeing them for a few seconds, she made a split second decision. Perhaps, if she was careful, neither would notice her eyes. That was far from likely, but she could try. Tilting her head slightly, she moved away from the trees but remained in the shadows of the branches above, making it hard for the sun to glint off of her eyes - that was what always gave them away.

"I'm sorry to intrude," She spoke politely, intent on simply getting directions (not that she needed them) and continuing on her way as though she'd been lost. Leila wasn't trusting enough to accept help from a stranger. Eyeing the man a little warily, she continued, "I believe I've gotten myself a little lost. Do you, by chance, know the way to Emond's Field?" It was close enough to where she was heading, in any case. She was still holding onto her side, loosely, but in a manner that disguised her injury; she couldn't drop her hand to one side since her shirt was light coloured and the blood stain would be obvious to a blind man. Besides, she didn't want to take pressure off of it. Offering the man and woman a weak smile, she shifted slightly and hoped that she could get herself away from them without making them curious.

Leila Thatcher

Snowbreeze

Watcher Leader

--------------------------------------------

There were several things about the woman who stood in front of them that made Adine curious, not least of which that she was walking in the woods of the Two Rivers and asking for directions. Obviously not a local, then, so why was she wandering around? The woman stood in shadow, her head tilted slightly, and one arm held by her side with a little more tension than was normal. Not a reaction that they were unused to, although around these parts her face didn't tend to be quite the same marker as it was in larger cities.

Dai was tense and ready for action, but wasn't wearing his sword on her instruction - it attracted too much attention. Instead he had a belt knife at his hip and more than a few about his person, and she could tell from the Bond that he was ready to use them at any provocation, but she shot him a quick look as she stepped closer to the woman. They’d not made eye contact yet, or at least Adine couldn’t really tell since her face was shadowed, and the Aes Sedai wondered what it was that would make a stranger in the Two Rivers avoid eye contact.

“Emond’s Field is that way.†Adine pointed without having to look to check, this was her home and she always knew where she was in relation to everything else. Or, well, things had obviously changed some, but she could still point to every house around the place as it had been when she was a child. That was something she’d avoided doing, so far, even the family that she was staying with didn’t know her true identity.

“But how is it that you have managed to get lost here in the Two Rivers? Not many strangers come here, or not many used to.†She was trying to guard her words, not give away more than she had to. She certainly didn’t look her age, not at first glance. And strangers were the most likely to tell her for what she truly was, yet here she was peering into one’s eyes. There was… an abnormality about them, but the full impact was hidden by the shadows of the branches. Still, unusual eyes were… discussed, but not with very much seriousness. Rumours, more than anything, darkfriends who called wolves to fight for them, some connection to the Dragon Reborn, but without any certainty about who they were and what they did, Adine wasn’t going to make a judgement. The darkfriend thing sounded like the same propaganda about the White Tower – difference was always seen as evil. It made her want to tear her hair out sometimes.

“Are you hurt?†There was a dark stain on the woman’s shirt, the side that she was so casually holding onto. “I can help.†She blurted it out before she could help it, but Adine had always used her ability to Heal as just as much of a tool for battle as her ability to harm. She was never going to be a Yellow, she didn’t have that sort of Talent, but the Green could take care of most wounds, if not the most serious. That always bothered her. Too many lay dead and dying around her in the battles she’d fought for her Talent to be of any use or comfort, but she still tried.

Holding herself as tall as she could manage, she assumed the Aes Sedai serenity that was a second skin to everyone who earned the Shawl. Her Ajah Sisters might have declared her a betrayer by now, for all she knew, but she’d still earned the shawl with her blood, sweat and tears, and they could never take that knowledge away from her.

~Adine

--------------------------------------------

Blood and bloody ashes.

Leila couldn't help but swear silently as the woman changed her stance slightly, holding herself in such a way that was unmistakably Aes Sedai. Of all the people she could have run into, she had to run into an Aes Sedai and her Warder, indicating that she was definitely down on her luck. She hadn't ever met an Aes Sedai in person, and had never wanted to meet an Aes Sedai in person; her golden eyes had made her cautious of strangers, and she had grown up hearing stories of Aes Sedai. While they were more than welcome in Caemlyn, only a fool would treat a woman of the Tower lightly, and she knew that with her golden eyes they were bound to think that something was amiss. She could hope that they wouldn't think her shadowspawn, but instead just think that she was ill, but people were unpredictable. If there was one thing she knew, it was that. She wasn't willing to risk her life on people she didn't know if she could trust.

They were curious, though; she could smell it. She supposed it made sense; a random woman holding her side in the middle of the Two Rivers? That wasn't a common sight anywhere. Besides, she wasn't about to let them see her eyes, which would make anyone suspicious. A plain traveller, maybe not, but definitely someone who at least knew the basics of the Great Game. Leila hadn't ever been good at that, even though she'd tried to learn how it was played while she'd been in Cairhien with a member of her network. All she'd learned was that it was rooted deeply in mistrust, the twisting of words, and coming out the most powerful.

"I'm fine," She said after a few seconds, doing her best not to make it seem like she was rushing the words out. "Thank you for your offer, though." Make it sound as though she thought they were nobles with access to a healer, or something of that sort. Shaking her head without realizing it - and thus letting the sun fall briefly on her eyes - she added quickly,

"I simply took a wrong turn somewhere back there-" There was indicated by a waving of her free hand, "-and got myself turned around. Thank you again, and I'll be on my way." Of course, it was at that moment that her side decided to throb again, and she drew her breath in sharply as she half staggered in her turn; clearly she was hurt, and now it was going to be impossible to hide. Besides, it was coming to her attention that she really did need a healer soon, and if she didn't find one, she'd probably end up passing out somewhere in the forest, and bleeding to death. The wound was more serious than she'd thought, and then she'd been willing to let herself believe. She was still reluctant to let them see her eyes, but hoped that maybe she could avoid any awkward questions. Turning slightly, she admitted in a strained voice,

"Perhaps I'm not as fine as I thought. I don't suppose you have some healall on her your person?" Blood and bloody ashes, She thought again.

---------------------------------------------

The woman's reassurance that she was fine wasn't particularly reassuring, especially since the toss of her head made golden eyes glint in the sun. Cocking her head to one side, Adine didn't say anything, but she was sure now that the woman was one of those she'd heard about, the ones with a connection to wolves. Darkfriends, it was said, but she didn't give that any creedence - there was no one group that was all good or all evil, most people alone were shades of grey.

The woman was vague about where she'd come from, but the intake of breath was an unmistakable sign that she wasn't as well as she was claiming, and Adine readied herself to talk sense into the woman no matter what. No sense in her dying just because she was being a stubborn fool, though the Aes Sedai had told her Warder on more than one occasion that she'd let him. Still, this woman wasn't Dai, and Addie realised that she didn't even know the woman's name yet. Finally, the stranger admitted that she might need help and asked if they had any healall, but Addie just snorted and raised her hands, gently grasping the woman's cheeks and embracing the Source. The wound was discovered quickly enough, not so serious that she couldn't Heal it, but definately bad enough that the woman wouldn't have made it to town. Addie wove the flows easily enough, Water and Air and Spirit in a complex pattern that some couldn't even begin to replicate, yet her Healing seemed clumsy in comparison to that of some of the Yellows. When it was done, she let go of the Source, but not of the woman's face, tilting it up slightly to get another view of her eyes in the sunlight. The Aes Sedai had never seen eyes like it - not on a human, anyway, and she hadn't seen wolves very often after leaving for the Tower.

"Interesting." She breathed the word, and raised her voice to call for Dai. "Get the lunch, and some water, please." Taking another look and thinking, Beautiful, she finally removed her hands, but stayed close to the stranger in case she was weak from the wound and then the Healing. They hadn't ridden today, and Adine cursed inwardly, because it would have been much easier to get the woman somewhere to recuperate, but instead she got Dai to lay out the picnic that they were going to have and ushered the woman onto the blanket. Sitting down herself, Addie offered the woman a loaf of bread and a chunk of cheese. "Eat, it will help to bring back your strength. I am Adine." She didn't add her other names, nor her title, even though she had revealed herself for Aes Sedai as surely as a glowing sign over her head would have. She didn't ask for the woman's name, but looked at her with an expectation that many would have been hard pressed to deny.

~Adine

Aes Sedai type lady

Wish my parents had let me dye a blue streak into my hair when I was 13... stupid lightfool parents. *grumbles*

Approved by the Seanchan!

*stamps*

Elia Darnel:

Quiet, loyal, prefers to follow than to lead, hopeless romantic, shy, not much of a party girl, dutiful, but she is fun... You just have to get to know her. :)

I'm here :)

~Kayls

I'm here, I'm here!

~Elia

Tower Guard girly

*snickers*

Just doing a fly by spam. I think that involves throwing cans from above, the trick to flying is to throw yourself at the ground and miss. I imagine that a spam can from high up would cause some damage, yeah.

And don't forget Swiss army knives. And chocolates. And those goofy looking Swiss guards in Vatican City.