Loraine nodded quietly, having watched him prepare himself to leave the room. He seemed to be prepared for battle, though on a very small scale. She ran her hand down her side, self-conscious about her own lack of protection. It would've been far too obvious on her, though. She pulled her cloak around her shoulders and clipped the catch closed, then pulled the billowing fabric around to hold closed in front of her. She adjusted her own sword to keep it flat along her leg so it didn't poke out of the cloak and give itself away. The hilt was tucked under her arm and she knew she'd be sporting a new bruise very soon, but, if she was lucky, that's all she'd be sporting. She'd rather have the sword than not.

She lifted the hood of her cloak in place, adjusting it so that the hem hung down over her eyes a bit, shading them from view. Turning towards Kynwric, she took a deep breath and moved towards the door. "It's now or never," she said quitely, pausing by the bed to retrieve her boots as Kynwric opened the door.

~Loraine

Kyn climbed into bed, he was too tired not to and he didn't waken until Lor woke him a few hours later. He would have protested her using her strength to clear away his weariness, he'd done with less sleep before without help, but she did it without asking and before he could even really sit up properly in the bed. When he spied the tray he shot her a look, a look meant to stop her from taking stupid risks. However as he dressed and ate whatever was on the tray.

he sighed as he strapped the sword belt around his waist, there was no good way to hie a sword once you were on foot and so it came down to simply wearing it being less obtrusive than any other manner of carry. Once he'd put the small steel and leather vambraces on his forearms and rolled his sleeves back down he looked at her. "I'm as ready as I can be." Slipping his gloves on his hands.

blah

"Nothing." Was his simple reply. "Its been very quiet all night with the exception of one drunk being tossed out of the inn across the street. But he stumbled off shortly thereafter." Kyn leaned his chair so all four legs were back on the floor and looked at Loraine, if he hadn't been so tired he'd have thought about taking her back to bed then and there, he always enjoyed it when she let her hair down. It was an unmistakable look to his wife, he was certain, but unfortunately he was exhausted from being up all night and so really just wanted sleep or Loraine to wash away the exhaustion.

Kyn listened as she talked herself to sleep, he didn't think they should count on anything but the pair of them still being capable of finishing this assignment. He settled his chair against the wall where he could lean it back and stare out the window down at the street, and where he could see down the street at the building with the blue door. How long did she say this journal had been hidden? Could nothing have changed in the intervening years? I mean the landmarks were a cobbler's shop and a blue door... how many cobblers have been in this town since the book was hidden? How many doors painted blue? Kyn stayed awake the entire night, keeping watch but nothing happened, not a single blessed thing unusual up and down the street and certainly nothing to do with that door. He almost found it odd in the lack of activity.

Kynwric watched as Loraine channeled the one power, it always amazed him how much joy opening herself to it brought. He could also feel the drain that doing that many complex things at once brought.

Finally, when she slumped in the chair he just shook his head. "You need sleep. So, either we can finish this in the morning or we can get it over with. But either way in 30 minutes you're getting in the bed." He didn't mention anything about their needing her at full capacity tomorrow, she knew, he knew it... he just hoped she didn't argue with him about getting the rest she needed.

Kynwric looked at her, someone would feel it?. "Loraine, there's no one here who would admit to feeling it even if they could and knew what they were feeling." He looked out the window, she just didn't understand how things were here. It was completely different, but he wasn't going to go into it now with her. There were more pressing problems. Olmena? No doubt the stress was wearing on Lor now, they didn't go looking for witches just because one was from here. This mission needed to be over with before the cracked. He returned his focus to the cobbler's.

"As for the cobbler and his wife, the best we can do is get the book and get out of here and cause as little disturbance as possible. As quickly as possible, so tomorrow works. Get the book, get on the horse, go home. Simple."

Kyn shrugged at the assertion that the rest of their group must be in town by now. "Nothing that indicates they've been taken, no. If they're that well hidden then its best to leave them that way. Too much effort rooting them out would be noticed. As for the cobbler's wife, cagey is exactly what I'd expect in this situation dear. Their life and livelihood is on the line and they can't just pack up and leave."

Finally he just looked at her, "Why don't you just make us private? Its not like they've a way of noticing." He also produced a little wedge of wood which he drove in between the floor and the bottom of the door. It may bot do much, but it would make the door more of a barrier as well as making a horrible racket in trying to get it open, sometimes technology trumped Channeling.

Kyn just looked at her, he could feel the tension building and he'd much prefer to go ahead and get this over with than have it last for the next few days.

"I didn't see anything that looked like the rest of the group. No good horses in any of the stables and from the few people I talked to no one's ridden in except for the usual merchants and locals." Kyn picked up a bit of the bread and meat and stuffed it in his mouth. "They should have been here by now dear. Long ago."

It had taken hours to do his circuit of the town, he'd had to stop and answer questions no less than three times to locals. He's finally found the cobbler's shop and had asked for his wife, which made the old man suspicious of course. Then he'd had to convince the woman that he was actually who he said he was, that was harder than he'd actually thought it was. Finally he dredged up the pass phrase the Green's used to identify themselves to their eyes and ears and that made the whole process infinitely easier. The woman still wouldn't tell him what he wanted to know though and so he had to promise to bring Loraine there on the morrow. That had been a fruitless stop indeed. Aes Sedai and their bloody secrets. He knew he was growing more agitated as he progressed, but finally he finished the check of the town, knew of at least three ways out of town from where the stayed and hadn't found hide nor hair of the rest of their group. With that he returned to the inn.

Once inside he collected dinner and two bottles of wine from the innkeeper. The food at least smelled delicious as the smell wafted from under the cloth covered tray as he climbed the stairs. He could feel the agitation in Loraine building too, sooner or later they were going to either have a fight or well, the opposite of a fight. He pushed the door open gently with his foot and set the tray on the table. "We'll meet with her in the morning about your shoes. Make sure you bring both pair." He added that just to make sure she brought the bloody shoes that did need repair. It wouldn't be unlike his wife to forget them in her hurry to get to the journal. Finally he pried one of the corks out of the wine bottle and set it on the table. "Let's eat."

Kynwric ran his hand over the rough kept beard he'd grown since leaving Tar Valon as they rode into Mardecin, he was slumped in his saddle to hide his height and build. His sword was wrapped in a blanket and slung at the back of his saddle to hide it from view as well. His only weapon to hand was a plain dagger that he'd had for years and years. It was the sort of thing a merchant might have sold to a farmer, nothing fancy but it was sharp. he let his eyes swing back and forth looking at everything and everyone. He kept his head straight ahead and bowed as if they had not a care in the world but finding someplace to sleep, with only an occasional glance backwards to check on Loraine and their rear. After examining each place to rent a room in turn he made his choice of one of the one that was simple, clean and moderately priced. He had no intention on hearing the lecture about beg bugs again, it was tiresome and Loraine had never actually had to sleep in a bed lousy with bed bugs.

Once he was done with the innkeeper and they were safely ensconced behind the door he straightened and stretched his back. He cocked his eyebrow at her assertion about the inn. "It's clean, it's not expensive and more importantly its not out of a farmer's price range. Which we are wife." he wasn't much in the mood for teasing right now, he was tense and his nerves were stretched thin being back in his home country. He had no illusions about what would happen if they were caught. "You can keep yourself in this room, you've too much the look of home about you to be of much use other than to draw attention." he slung their saddle bags on the chair and went to digging in them for one of the spare coin purses. "I'll check in with the cobbler and see that your shoes are mended." She'd only drilled that into him the last few nights, that the contact was the cobbler's wife it was as if they were first bonded again. "I'll be back." and he ducked out the door having tucked the purse inside his coat.

Kyn slowly worked his way down the length of her hair, putting it up into the braid she had asked for. "The only other way is to invade or trust to luck. So, plan the routes. It is pretty simple, when we cross the border the road is going to fork, send one group down one fork and the other around the other way. It'll take more time for the one heading away from Mardecin so it may be best if the second group waits for a few days here so that we all end up in town about the same time. I'd say we ought to be the ones who spend more time in Amadacia than the others, I at least sound local. This bunch can come straight into town along the first fork and we'll circle around and come in from the other side. I'd plan for it to take us, 5 days. One into Amadacia, 3 to skirt across country to pick up the road and another to be back to Mardecin along that road." He let her hair fall from his hands as he finished with the braid. "I'd prefer it we're you and I alone, but I understand that you don't want Olmena alone. So we can swaddle her up like a grandmother. You're going to need a bonnet though."

"No one? Perhaps you can tell me tomorrow while we ride." He left the res of her comments alone for the moment and sighed as he took the brush up again and began to run it through her hair. "Farmers wife, is that what we're playing at this time?" He made a show of looking around the camp. "With this bunch? We'd have been better off travelling under guise of a menagerie." Once he felt he had used the brush enough he began to run his fingers through her hair and separate it so it could be put up in a braid. "This will take a while... and where did you get the idea that Amadacian farm wives wear their hair in a braid?"

He stopped, resting his other hand, the one she hadn't grasped on her shoulder and sighed deeply. "Every other time we've discussed this before there has been an alternative. Some other option that kept us from it, now there is no other option. We go in, we get the book and we get out. You can worry about getting everyone else out, I am concerned with getting you out. There is nothing else to do." He slipped his hand free of her grasp to settle it on her other shoulder and began to work at the knots there. "And worrying about it, being scared of it and doing it any way makes you brave and you have alway been the best mother and wife I could ask for."

Kyn felt the tension in his wife through the bond, he could feel it the whole way round the camp and it was distracting him to no end. He had tripped over 3 different sets of roots and nearly run into a tree at one point as he made his way through the nightly routine and when he finally finished and began to head back towards their tent Kyn was relieved that there were others who would be doing the same thing he had just done. It wasn't that he feared he had missed a danger, but that he had missed the clues to a hint that danger had been here recently.

The tent was a small four walled thing that just barely fit Lor, him and the few things that could not chance getting wet. And he saw her sitting on the other side of it facing the fire as she took her hair down. Kyn paused by the backside of the tent to watch her for a moment before slipping silently up behind her to pick up the silver brush and begin to run it through her blonde tresses. "Relax, this will be over soon and there isn't a sign that anyone knows we're coming. Assuming that light forsaken Asha'man doesn't blow the whole countryside up tonight." He glanced up at where she was staring a few times, trying hard to make out something in the distance and finally decided that she was just staring at the border. "It's just another border love, nothing we haven't crossed before."

Just bruised? Be more careful... BTW, I am off to a war again this weekend... don't make me less able to defend myself.

And of course they're ok with that... aren't they? *looks around*

Ummm... back?!

You, Aes Sedai of mine, need to be more careful cause that BLOODY HURTS!

"Light no, if I ever do figure you out I'll certainly let you know..." He took the food and smiled, taking a deep breath in to inhale the armoas. "I have no idea how you manage to cook so well in such poor conditions..."

Sounds like fun...

Kynwric Larind's Bio

Email need to change to: kynwric@gmail.com

Age needs to change to 40.

Rank to Grandmaster

WS to 18

Weapons to Broad Sword, Shield and Long Bow in that order.

You can add he's married and bonded to Loraine Sedai of the Green if you wish.

Gabriel turned and watched the whole time Julianne was gone only turning back to the meal she had prepared as he heard her coming back to the entrance of the cave. When she handed him the bottle of wine he smiled and nodded, "of course.." and took his time opening the bottle before handing it back to her. "I wonder what Swandell is having of his meal tonight... since obviously you swiped the best of it." He didn't take his eyes of of her the whole time she returned to the 'kitchen' and back, a smile playing across his lips. Not even when she proffered the cup of wine did he move his eyes from her, taking in different parts at different times.

Kyn just looked at her as she flopped onto the bed, having caught the pillow against his chest. After a few moments he settled him self on the bed beside her and lay a hand on her leg. "We'll make it..." He didn't add the somehow to the end of the sentence.

What kind of fun is that?

He waved his hand at her question, replying. "I checked all the snares and tracked a buck for a while... but nothing to show for it. You've done much better than I... dare I ask how?" He was afraid she'd done something rash since the coin had run out from their acquisition from Swandell a few weeks back.