Author's Note: Well, here's the first chapter of a new fanfic. I've decided that since I have been previously flamed to the max for Mary Sue-ness, to try to make something very not-Sue, if that makes any sense. I haven't thought out the whole plot yet, so it could lead to an A/R type of thing. I'm putting this in the time frame of the 3rd-ish book. Please review! I'm not asking you to sugar-coat it and absolutely love my fanfic, but no flames. I'm perfectly okay with you not loving my story. There is a line between constructive criticism and unleashing your irritation on someone with a tongue-lashing. Believe me. It's true.

Sweet Simplicity

Bethania was a simple woman, if a touch stubborn. Young, yet newly widowed, she had been married to one of the Children of the Light, whom died tragically in battle. As a basket weaver in a small town in the low foothills in Cairhien, she could hardly make a living from her creations. In a painful decision, she sent her young son and daughter to relatives better off, in hopes that they would be raised well.

Standing in her kitchen looking out the window, she idly fixed her pale blue woolen dress and apron. The golden afternoon light gently tinged her well-kept garden, and shimmered through a decorative colored broken glass mobile hanging from her porch. She smiled wistfully - her husband helped her children make that for her. Determinedly, she set the fire alight and poured water in the large pot. Dinner won't make itself, she knew for a fact.

She sat down at the small simply carved wooden table off to the side of her kitchen. She had a pile of completed baskets sitting there, waiting to be delivered the next morning, and another that was nearly finished on the table before her. She picked up the basket and examined it closely. She put in a few more weavings while pondering how to color the next basket, waiting for the water in the large pot to boil. Her deft hands, small if calloused, worked quickly around the edge of the basket. She set her work down when she heard the water simmering, and dumped some vegetables and meat in the pot. The ordinary day didn't call for anything spectacular to be made.

Leaning on the counter and watching the setting sun, her mind slowly wandered. She wanted to know how her children were, and hoped the Light blessed her husband's soul. Her thoughts were broken by the laughter of her two neighbors, Natile and Fylene, who came to her gate and were chattering up gossip. Bethania waved to them to come in, and moved again to the fire to put on a kettle for tea. The two women walked in, and embraced Bethania.

"Well! Dinner already?" Natile inquired.

"Yes, I'm afraid so." Bethania replied and shrugged meekly.

"Ha! Girl, we need to get you back with a man." Fylene shifted her weight and crossed her arms.

"I agree. Grief is grief, but... don't you think there might be... a time to move on?" Natile inquired more timidly this time.

Bethania was, admittedly, a little shocked. She had never considered another man. She felt a twinge of compulsion to dig her heels in.

"I'm all right. I don't need a man." She felt her face fall a slight downcast, but tried to stay upbeat. "Besides," she continued, "women don't have to have a man around constantly to bother them." She smiled cheekily while she moved to pour hot water and herbs for three cups of tea.

"Oh, Light save me," Fylene replied, "I can't believe I'm hearing this! Women belong with men! That's how life works!"

Bethania's eyes nearly narrowed at the comment, but she retained her composure.

"Some of us," she gamely replied back, "do not work with life." She quietly sipped her tea and watched the two other women over the rim of her cup. She saw their thoughtful, if mildly annoyed faces and knew she hit a nerve. Oh yes, she knew her friends' lives very well. Prosperous in a small town, husbands to care for them, children to care for, a happy life, for what came to them. Bethania had some pitfalls, but wasn't ready for anyone to start pitying her for the things they saw she lacked.

Later that evening, after her friends went along their way back to their own houses to make their own families' dinners, Bethania was trying to finish the basket she was working on earlier, unsuccessfully. Her mind kept wandering to her family. Shaking her head, she tried to focus on the basket. But there was always a twinge of pain in more recent days. Bethania was having difficulties not breaking down and crying with the thoughts of missing her children and husband, living a lonely life in her small house. Perhaps I should get a pet. Maybe a cat? Something else to put my mind on... Bethania decided that tomorrow she would go out and look for a kitten in the town, perhaps buy one.

A scream sounded distantly in the town. Bethania sat up rigid. What under the Light could that be? Her town was obviously not one for thieves and murderers. And yet, more screams sounded, spreading out in the area and coming closer. Bethania immediately blew out the candles in her kitchen and looked out the window, trying in vain to see what was possibly coming. She heard loud trudging footsteps and beast-like snarling. It couldn't possibly be Trollocs, could it? She panicked and ran through her house, and found a decent closet to lock herself up in, near two exits in case she needed to run quickly. She prayed she had cut off any sort of light, and had possibly left her home looking unused. She grimaced, knowing her garden was indeed well kept.

With a bang, she heard the kitchen door bang open, and hungry growling accompanying feet, claw-like, paw-like, and hoof-like. Bethania held her breath.

"Search the house!" a dark and threatening voice called.

That was most certainly human. Bethania pondered. She was jerked out of her thoughts when her closet door ripped open to a snarling beast. Bethania shrieked and tried to escape, but was grasped by the back of her neck roughly and drug towards the kitchen. Bethania struggled still, unwilling to let herself be thrown in a Trolloc cook pot. The scary Trolloc with human eyes and a bear's snout for a mouth where the nose and mouth should have been growled at her and gripped her neck tighter, digging its claws more. Bethania fought tears of pain as she was dropped onto her own kitchen floor. A pair of clean boots walked up and stopped merely a foot from her.

Carefully, Bethania looked up and examined the tall, dark man before her. He was well dressed, looking more like a lord than anything else, with a well-fitting silk black coat and close-fitting black breeches neatly tucked in to his knee-high boots. She was quite startled before she realized what the man was. Darkfriend... she snarled to herself. Being wife to one of the Children of the Light had brought considerably more hatred towards darkfriends than the average person who still lived under the Light. The man picked her up roughly by the arm, and set her on her feet, standing her unsteadily. He was quite tall and handsome, she cursed herself for thinking. Yet she merely came up to the middle of his chest. Looking into his face, she couldn't quite place an age on him.

The man smiled a smile that didn't reach his eyes.

"What have we here? A pretty girl living alone in her house? How very unsafe..." he trailed off with a grin that sent chills down Bethania's back. He grabbed her chin and turned her head left and right, apparently examining her. She bit back a reply and sizzled quietly to herself. "You know, glaring is not very good for a face like yours. Makes more wrinkles when you are older." The bloody man had the nerve to smirk! Bethania's teeth ground in reply. The man pulled her even closer by the waist, and smiled once more, that cold smile. "How about I spare you as Trolloc feast and you come live with me?" Bethania's eyes widened in surprise, but her anger boiled more. She would not be another woman for this man whom she suspected already had many more women to sleep with.

With a useless attempt to bite back the coldness in her voice, she replied,

"I have lived my entire life under the Light. I would not spoil myself for the Shadow, even in death." Even if she had to crane her neck to glare at him properly, her fury spat at him with every word. The man's eyes narrowed in reply, but Bethania continued, "I would not come with you for any reason! You... you... you murderous and horrible darkfriend!" She practically screamed at the man, and tried to push herself out of his grasp. He merely grimaced and held her tighter to himself, trying to contain his own self.

"I see," he responded. "Well, perhaps you are indeed a waste for Trollocs. No, I think a woman of your stature would do well in..." He pondered for a moment. "In the Waste." His evil grin made Bethania struggle more, but he grasped her head in one hand, which practically encompassed the entire thing. She shrieked with pain as a burning icy sensation went through her body, and over every inch of her skin. Bethania could feel nothing besides pain as the man roughly put a dark and heavy woolen cloak on her and chucked her onto the ground. She landed on hard, dirty dry ground, and every pore in her body was immediately sucked dry of any moisture, and in the darkness she felt very cold. Bethania curled up right there on the ground, shivering from the cold, and shaking with sobs. The pain... Oh the pain...