Toveine stared at the door, willing herself to remain awake – or conscious, in any case. They had chained her to a wall in a cell that would make the White Tower's dungeons look comfortable. It stank of decay, as though corpses had been left to rot in a corner somewhere.
She'd been here for days now – five, six, a week? She'd lost count. There was no window to indicate the passage of time.
She'd made a few attempts at breaking through her shield, with no success. Soon she would be too weak to even try; they hadn't fed her, and she was only allowed one goblet of water per day – or what she assumed was a day. She wondered who was holding her shield. The only Asha'man she'd recognised were Mishraile and Coteren, and she doubted that the latter could manage her shield on his own. By all logic, it had to be Mishraile. Taim wouldn't stoop as low as to see to such menial tasks, certainly.
Toveine shuddered, for various reasons. The cold, for one, and the humidity. Of course, she knew how to ignore the cold, but it took some conscious effort, and she certainly was not going to waste what little energy she had left on doing that.
The sheer proximity of the Myrddraal was another cause of her shivering. It – they? – had to be just outside her cell.
When she'd spotted the Myrddraal, the day they'd brought her to the basement, Toveine had understood what was going to happen to her. She'd heard rumours of this practice. Turning: a simple, unthreatening word used to describe a vile process.
Taim was going to force her to join the Shadow. He was going to shatter her very soul. He was going to undo her and turn her into something else, something so dark and inhuman and wrong that she dared not dwell on the thought.
Toveine shuddered, because she knew she wouldn't leave this place alive.
Logain had tried to send reassurance through the bond, but how could she trust him? The foolish man had gotten them into this mess in the first place! I have a plan, he'd assured her. It will all be over before you know it. Toveine scoffed. That bloody oaf. He really was just a pretty face, after all.
Gabrelle was a fool for bedding him – and even more so for loving him. Toveine was almost certain that was the case. She masked the bond whenever the two of them were being…intimate, but Gabrelle couldn't quite conceal her emotions when she wasn't paying attention. Toveine sometimes caught her staring at Logain, the adoration plain on her ageless face. As for Logain's feelings, she wasn't sure what to make of them. He liked the Brown, yes, and he certainly enjoyed her…company, but Toveine didn't think he loved her. When it came down to emotions, she could sum up Logain's in three words: anger, resentment, suspicion. He distrusted everyone; his followers, Gabrelle and herself included. Even the Dragon Reborn. Oddly enough, he didn't seem to resent Taim any more than he did al'Thor. He felt contempt for the Saldaean, but he didn't hate him. Not even now.
She rolled her eyes in exasperation. What had she come to? She ought to be looking for ways to escape, to free Logain and herself, instead of analysing the bloody man's emotions. It didn't help her concentration that she was dizzy from lack of sleep and sustenance.
She wondered how long they would leave her to rot in this bloody cell before they came for her. They clearly wanted to weaken her as much as possible without actually killing her; how long until they were satisfied that she was frail and sickly enough to be Turned?
As it turned out, not much longer from the moment she asked herself that very question.
The Asha'man who unlocked the door was not one she'd ever encountered. Taim must have been busy recruiting while Logain and she were away. He looked Cairhienin: pale, short of stature, clean-shaven. His features were perfectly unremarkable, save for a large mole at the base of his skull. He didn't say a word to her as he unfastened her chains – with cursed saidin, of course, not with his own hands. Toveine was aware that the taint had been removed from the male half of the Source – she'd experienced Logain's wonderment first-hand – but she still didn't trust men who could channel. She never would.
The main problem was that she had no idea what the man was weaving. She hated not knowing. She liked being in control of everything, and being faced with a male channeler was the opposite of being in control, especially when one was chained and shielded and otherwise incapacitated.
Her head swam as she took a precarious step forward, as soon as the chains were gone. Light, she felt dizzy. How was she supposed to come up with an escape plan when she could barely stand?
The Asha'man grabbed her arm and pushed her out of the cell. Toveine tried to remain upright and failed miserably. She stumbled and dropped to the ground with all the grace of a sack of potatoes. It took every bit of her usual fortitude to muster enough strength to get back on her feet. The Asha'man gazed at her blankly as she did so. Not so much as a smirk from him. No cruel taunting; not even an impatient sigh.
Peace, was he one of the Turned?
Toveine straightened up, brushing off dust from her already grimy dress, knowing it was useless. It was a reflex, deeply ingrained since her early childhood. She studied the Asha'man more closely. His brown eyes held no expression. He might have been bored, she supposed, or simply tired, but she had a queasy feeling that her initial assumption was the correct one.
Without a word, he gestured for her to move forward. She complied reluctantly, glancing over her shoulder as she did so. The bond told her that Logain was being held in one of the cells behind her. He appeared to be asleep. Burn the bloody man! She was about to be converted to the Shadow against her will, and the mighty Lord Logain napped? In all fairness, Toveine amended, he might have been unconscious rather than asleep. But still.
The Asha'man led her to another room. It was about as large as Logain's house here at the Black Tower, and there was a single table at its centre. Like in the rest of the basement – dungeons; might as well call a spade a spade – the stench of rot and putrefaction permeated the air. There were strange implements affixed to the walls, which glowed with a dull white light. It was not enough to illuminate the entire room, but Toveine saw more than she wanted. Her eyes fell on stains that looked suspiciously like dried blood. They randomly bedecked the table and the ground beneath it.
As soon as she decided not to focus too closely on the smudges, Toveine realised that she was surrounded. Myrddraal sprang out of the shadows. She did a quick count: thirteen.
It was one thing to have a strong suspicion that something terrible was about to happen to oneself, and quite another to have that fear confirmed in the worst possible way. The Fetches drew on her sudden terror, which she'd attempted to keep concealed, even from herself, until then. They magnified it thousandfold.
Despite decades of conscientious training at the White Tower, where she'd learned to school her emotions to the point of complete detachment, Toveine turned on her heels and tried to run, but she hit a wall of living flesh. Mishraile held out a hand reflexively to stabilise her, but she pushed him away in revulsion. "Don't touch me," she croaked. Her mouth was dry as dust. She considered moving past him, but saw that more men were filing in behind the youthful Asha'man. She didn't have to count them to know there were thirteen.
Taim was one of them. His dark eyes regarded her with pity.
Toveine felt faint; her knees wobbled and she slumped to the floor. Strong hands carried her a short distance and laid her on something solid, none too gently. The impact was enough for her to regain full consciousness. She didn't struggle; she was bound, with what she assumed were threads of saidin-weaved Air.
The Asha'man assembled on one side of the table, to Toveine's left, while the Myrddraal gathered to her right. The air in the room became heavier, darker. Oppressing, suffocating. Toveine sought Taim's eyes, not even embarrassed at this point by the tears that rolled down her cheeks or the obvious tremor in her voice. "Please," she murmured. "I beg you, Taim, please-"
His face was utterly impassive, his gaze implacable. "It will be easier for everyone if you don't fight it," he murmured.
It took Toveine a long time to realise that the screams that echoed in the dingy room were her own.
Logain's mind was flitting between consciousness and unconsciousness. One moment he was painfully aware of the chains that pinned him to the ground, the next he was drifting toward a semi-comatose state. He had nightmares, worse than usual. Could this be just another bad dream?
A sharp tug from the bond. Toveine.
His eyes sprang open. Toveine was moving – or being moved.
He grimaced as he tried to stretch. They could have at least chained him in a comfortable position, burn them. How long had he been here? Days, certainly. Perhaps as long as a week. He focused on the bond – the one he shared with Gabrelle this time. She was asleep. Was it night? He had no way of knowing.
Light, he was starving. Quite literally. Taim hadn't bothered to feed him, not once since Logain was captured. Was the man hoping to render him more susceptible to…Turning? Logain remembered his encounter with Ishamael, two years ago. He had mentioned the process, but Logain hadn't believed him. He'd dismissed it as a bluff on the deranged Forsaken's part. He refused to believe it could be achieved. Dedicating one's soul to the Shadow had to be a conscious decision; surely it couldn't be forced upon anyone. Logain served the Light, and he would die before he was brought to the Shadow. Nothing Taim did could change that.
Toveine was in trouble, that much was certain. She was terrified, and fear was not an emotion Logain would normally associate with the Red. He tested the chains for the umpteenth time, then tested the shield that kept saidin at bay, in vain. He groaned in frustration, but it turned into a grimace as agony washed over him.
Toveine! he yelled in his head, as though she could hear him through the bond. She was so close, they might as well be hurting Logain directly. Though he knew the pain wasn't really his, it echoed in his body. Toveine's screams resonated within the basement as they did within his very soul.
Logain did his best to send strength and courage throughout the bond. Don't give in. I have faith in you. Don't let the bastards grind you down. She was the most stubborn woman Logain had ever known; surely she could resist Taim's pathetic attempt to-
The bond went still.
Gabrelle started awake, feeling disoriented. Light, what a horrible nightmare…
Not for the first time, she'd dreamed that Logain was being tortured. Flayed alive, this time. His persecutor was always the same person: Mazrim Taim.
A shiver travelled down the length of her spine. Something was wrong, and it had nothing to do with her dream. She sought Logain through the bond they shared, which was made difficult with the distance.
He was in pain; she hadn't been imagining it. For a moment, her mind was entirely focused on the agony Logain seemed to be suffering. Everything else receded.
She couldn't say how long it lasted. It could have been a minute or an hour, and she imagined it must have felt even longer to Logain. What was going on? What was Taim doing to him? Was he torturing him for the sake of it? He had to be. Logain didn't know anything that Taim didn't; torturing him for information would be a waste of time and energy.
Gabrelle wanted to do something, anything, but Logain had strictly forbidden it and, because of their tweaked bond, she had no choice but to obey. Do not, under any circumstances, come to the Black Tower without my express permission. Don't let any of the men follow me. Don't call on anyone I wouldn't trust, and especially not al'Thor, if anything goes wrong. Try as she might, she couldn't find a loophole. In any case, Logain didn't trust anyone, so her options were scarce, not to say inexistent. I will summon you when Taim's been dealt with. That had been five days ago. She hadn't heard anything from him since – except through the bond, but none of what she'd felt boded well.
Atal couldn't keep it up a moment longer. He broke the line of assembled Asha'man, which earned him a dozen irritated, grumbled curses, as well as blood-curling hisses from the Fetches, and he ran outside the room. He retched in a corner, unable to take another step, and fell heavily to his knees. His face and hands felt clammy. His head ached from all the screaming. His heart was pounding.
Turning the Red witch hadn't posed much of a problem. It had been a matter of minutes before the light in her eyes died. Toveine wasn't dead, exactly, but the part of her that served the Light had been extinguished, leaving only a husk of the person she used to be. It served her well, as far as Atal was concerned. She'd dedicated her life to gentling men who could channel, effectively killing them in the process. Atal and his colleagues had simply returned the favour.
Turning Logain, on the other hand… That was something else entirely.
The task of Turning men was rendered extremely complex by the fact that only male channelers were presently available to assist the Myrddraal. Logain wasn't the first man they'd been working on, but he certainly was the most challenging. Atal had never seen anything quite like it. He fought them with every fibre of his being, with every ounce of strength he possessed.
They couldn't work the men too long. The pain was – judging from the victims' ear-piercing wails and shrieks – excruciating; such prolonged agony could drive a person insane or kill them, if kept up for more than a few minutes at a time, especially when said people were already weakened. They'd accidentally killed three young Soldiers in the early days.
It typically took them at least two sessions to successfully Turn a man to the Shadow. Three was the longest one of them had resisted. The only one who'd withstood four had died. M'Hael always let a week go by between sessions, so the body could partly recover – it was just enough to keep them alive, really.
This was Logain's first session, but Atal had a feeling that it would take a while to Turn him.
He wasn't sure why he'd suddenly felt sick. He despised the man and everything he represented – he was arrogant, condescending, and a bloody nobleman at that. Everything had always been handed to him on a silver platter. The only reason he had followers, as far as Atal could divine, was because someone had Healed him. They worshipped him for something he wasn't even responsible for.
To be fair, Atal had felt just as bad Turning the other men. They hadn't done anything to deserve this – they were simply the most convenient victims.
"Mishraile." The M'Hael's voice floated to him, slowly bringing him out of his spell of dizziness. A strong hand landed on his shoulder.
Atal blinked and bit his lower lip hard, trying to regain his senses. He tasted blood. He glanced up gingerly. "Sorry," he muttered. Light, but this was humiliating! That the M'Hael should witness such weakness from him… "Must be something I ate," he mumbled. Sniggers from his fellow Asha'man who, Atal noticed, had formed a circle around him.
Coteren was leering openly. "Can't bear to see Logain hurt, lad? You in love with him, too? That fairy of a Dedicated ain't enough for you?"
There were more jeers from the others, but they were cut short when Coteren collapsed to the ground in a heap, knocked-out cold by a sharp thread of intertwined Air and Fire. "Everyone out," M'Hael snapped. "Take him with you," he added with a disdainful grimace directed at Coteren's limp body.
Atal heaved himself up as the others departed quickly. He had to lean against the wall to hold himself upright. His cheeks reddened in embarrassment as the M'Hael studied him critically. "No more Turning for you, Asha'man," he declared eventually. He sighed heavily. "I would have kept you out of this entirely from the beginning, but with Moridin borrowing my men every other day…" He shook his head firmly. "Logain's unconscious. Help me get him back to his cell, will you?"
"May I be of assistance, Master?"
Atal glanced past the M'Hael at Toveine, who stood perfectly still, just a few paces away. He hadn't even noticed her. The M'Hael flicked his hand dismissively. "No need. Just stay there and await my orders."
Toveine bowed her head. "As you command, so I obey." Without another word, she resumed her motionless vigil.
Atal swallowed hard. Seeing her like this was…uncanny. Creepy, really.
He couldn't quite picture Logain bowing and scraping like that, but it would happen, sooner or later. With a resigned sigh, he followed the M'Hael to the Turning chamber.
M'Hael dismissed Mishraile once Logain was securely bound. Toveine could take up his shield for the time being. It seemed unduly cruel to have Logain shielded by his own Warder – if she could be called that – but Mishraile really needed to rest, and M'Hael had more important things to see to. At least the former Aes Sedai could be useful. He wasn't sure what to do with her now that she was under his command.
Moridin had explained that he needed thirteen women to assist the Myrddraal. A single woman working with a dozen men would be ineffective – they couldn't even link. Where M'Hael was supposed to find a dozen more Aes Sedai, he had no idea, especially now that Logain had dispatched his followers and their bonded Aes Sedai to Illian and Arad Doman, but Moridin didn't seem to care. It wasn't his problem. He expected results, not excuses.
Initially, M'Hael had hoped that he could bargain with the Forsaken. If only he could see Neya, make certain she was alive and well, then he would redouble his efforts. If Moridin sent Neya back, M'Hael would go to the White Tower and capture a dozen Aes Sedai himself.
Except that Moridin knew that Neya and he were bonded.
M'Hael had no idea how the Forsaken knew, but that meant he had no leverage – not unless he decided to sever the bond, which he certainly wouldn't do. No matter how…occupied Neya might be at the moment, with Light knew whom, M'Hael still wanted her back. Now more than ever, in fact. Even if it meant that she would know what he's been up to for the past few weeks.
In the meantime, he had nothing, no excuses for stalling. That was why he'd placed all his hopes on Logain in the first place.
And, despite the dire situation he found himself in, M'Hael had to admit that Logain was holding his own. Oh, he'd screamed, of course – they all did – but the amount or intensity of the victims' howls was not necessarily an indication of how they were faring. The first Soldier they'd lost to the process had survived four sessions, and his cries had outmatched Toveine's and Logain's combined. Screaming was really just a way to exteriorise the pain – and the terror, and the horror. It had no influence on a person's will or fortitude, and therefore on their capacity to resist Turning.
He was thankful to Mishraile for cutting this session short. How he hated this! He would rather delegate the task to any other Asha'man, but he had to be there. He was the strongest among them, and Moridin would surely find out if he shirked his duties. Hopefully, Logain would hold on until rescue came. There had to be a rescue party somewhere, right? Logain couldn't have been that confident in his triumph over M'Hael. He couldn't have been that bloody stupid.
But what in the Pit of Doom were they waiting for? Gabrelle had to know that something was wrong. Five days had already gone by since Logain was captured, and M'Hael dared not leave more than a week between sessions – it would make Moridin suspicious. In seven days, Logain would have to go through it all again.
How many sessions could the bloody insufferable man endure?