Thanks to Psyco Faerie for the support in my story…here's another chapter for you…:))
Chapter 12: The Rift
After the episode with the Forsaken, Kiara warded her study and chambers carefully. The cut on her back had been Restored, but the memory of the pain stabbed at her once every now and then.
It had been a week. She lay in her bed, unable to sleep. Asmodean would haunt her forever. With a sigh she rolled over to lie on her back.
Flaming eyes filled her vision. Stunned, she reached for saidar only to find it slipping away whenever she touched it. The owner of the eyes began to talk to her. There were no words, only a series of … images that conveyed a message.
-You will be my loyal, unwavering servant-
-You will do what I tell you to-
-You will not channel unless I tell you to do so-
-You will not attempt to escape through any means-
-You will not resist-
Kiara wanted to tell the presence that it was being ridiculous, that she would never be anyone's servant, but all of a sudden the sentiments vanished, to be replaced by an eagerness to serve. And she was abruptly falling through an endless dark. Maniacal laughter filled her ears as the darkness invaded her consciousness.
Lanfear very nearly jumped when the gateway appeared a foot from her bed, and a severe-looking woman stepped through. A Dreadlord. She sat up, glaring. The Dreadlord hurriedly dipped a precise curtsy.
"The Great Master Ishamael wishes to see all of the Chosen in the Royal Palace of Mar Ruois, Great Mistress," she said meekly.
Lanfear stood. "Very well," she replied icily. "Tell Ishamael I'll be along in a few minutes. Be gone with you."
The Dreadlord gave another curtsy and vanished through a second gateway. Lanfear washed and dressed, wondering what the Betrayer of Hope wanted this time. He thought himself Nae'blis. He certainly bossed the other Chosen around enough. So it was Mar Ruois again. He probably wanted to get started with the siege of Paaran Disen. Overeager, by Lanfear's standards.
Carefully buckling a belt of fine silver links over her white dress, Lanfear made her own gateway. She stepped though into the council room in Mar Ruois. Ishamael stood at the head of the long, rectangular table.
The seat immediately to his right was empty. The other five seats on that side of the table were occupied by Aginor, Rahvin, Sammael, Demandred and Balthamel, in order of their closeness to Ishamael. On the other side, in the same order, sat Be'lal, Semirhage, Moghedien, Mesaana, Graendal and Asmodean. Lanfear took the vacant seat gracefully.
"You took long enough," Ishamael reprimanded her. She ignored him.
He gestured to the girl dressed in a cream-coloured dress, who had been standing in a corner of the room with her head bowed. She looked up and approached, spreading her skirts wide in a deep curtsy.
Lanfear's breath caught sharply, and heard four others echo her. The serving girl was Kiara. Kiara! Ishamael had used Compulsion on her—her eyes were blank and glazed. "Go and fetch the maps," Ishamael ordered.
Kiara curtsied again and left the room. Immediately Lanfear's hand slammed down hard on the table. The other Chosen jumped. "What is the meaning of this?" she asked angrily. She glared at Ishamael for a moment before glancing at the others.
Aginor looked confused. Rahvin's expression was blank. Sammael, Be'lal and Demandred had identical expressions of suppressed anger on their faces. Balthamel looked downright uneasy, but that was because Asmodean, who was sitting opposite him, was burning a hole though the wall behind Balthamel with the pure fury in his gaze. Seldom did Asmodean dare to show temper. Semirhage was smiling—she probably had a hand in this. Moghedien, Mesaana and Graendal were exchanging looks of puzzlement.
Ishamael smiled. "I have not damaged your precious cousin," he said calmly. "She has a web of surface Compulsion around her mind, tied quite firmly. Once it has been lifted I'm very sure she will return to her normal self. Of course, with the web still around her, she can be told to take her own life …"
Lanfear's gaze hardened. "Are you threatening me?"
Kiara entered the room where the Chosen were meeting with the maps in her arms. Curtsying without spreading her skirts, she laid them on the table in front of Ishamael. No one noticed her. Lanfear, Sammael, Be'lal and Demandred were on their feet. Asmodean was on the edge of his seat.
Suddenly, Asmodean slammed both hands on the table and stood as well. The four Chosen who had been arguing with Ishamael cut off short, gaping. "This isn't funny at all, Ishamael," he said in a low, angry voice. "Let her go. Now."
Kiara thought she saw open admiration in the gazes of some of the Chosen gathered there. Not in Ishamael's, though. His eyes blazed with anger at being challenged so blatantly, and by someone he considered very much beneath him, at that. A weave of Air invisible to her knocked Asmodean off his feet. Unbidden, a sudden wave of fury welled up in her, though she did not quite understand why.
The eyes of the female Chosen were drawn away from either Asmodean or Ishamael by Kiara, who was glowing like a small sun. Ishamael whirled around to look at her as well, his eyes wide as the web of Compulsion he had tied around her mind simply—there was no other word for it—shattered.
Everything came back to Kiara. Ishamael had used Compulsion on her. It only added to her rage. She felt someone trying to put a shield between her and saidar, and a quick glance around told her that it was Semirhage. Suddenly, the light of saidar appeared around Lanfear, too, and the light around Semirhage winked out.
Kiara dropped, and a bar of balefire flew over the top of her head. She hit Ishamael with a weave of Air. The entire building began to shake—the balefire had punched through numerous walls.
All of a sudden, everyone was channelling, including Semirhage and Asmodean, who had picked himself up off the floor. Gateways appeared all over the room, and the Forsaken fled through them.
With a roar, Ishamael threw another balefire at Kiara. A gateway opened in front of her, and the balefire flew through it to wherever it led to. Someone grabbed Kiara by her wrist and pulled her through a second gateway. It snapped shut the moment she was through.
"Are you all right?" Asmodean asked as he turned her to face him. They were deep in the heart of a forest.
"Yes, I think so," Kiara replied, shaking the last dregs of the Compulsion off. She shuddered as they went away, tugging at her consciousness as they did. It was scary to think that Ishamael had gotten past her warding. She plucked at the silk of her dress. "This is the most disgusting colour ever," she declared. "Who wants to walk around wearing a dress the colour of tea with too much milk in it?"
Asmodean laughed, though it sounded a little strained. Kiara walked up to a tree and touched its trunk. It looked vaguely familiar. "Where are we?" she asked.
"The forest about a mile from Shorelle," he replied quietly. "I discovered this place when I was a boy."
Kiara's hand fell from the surface of the tree trunk. She channelled, and a small, sharp weave of Air cut a blossom from the tree's high branches. The simple white flower drifted down lazily, and she caught it in her hands.
"So this is where you got it from," she said.
"What?" Asmodean asked in confusion.
"You tried to give me a flower on the day I arrived at Shorelle with my family, remember?" she answered.
He looked hard at the pale flower in her hand. "Yes," he said. "I remember." Suddenly he was coughing, his hand pressed over his mouth. Kiara dropped the flower, startled. The coughing fit subsided, and Asmodean was bent over, the hand that had been over his mouth pressed to a nearby tree trunk for support. He let it fall away after a while.
As he straightened, Asmodean moved his body to block the trunk, but not before Kiara saw the red stain there. Without a word she slammed a shield between the man and saidin, at the same time sending a weave of Delving into his body. The pain she detected made her take one step back. There were four broken ribs, with one pressing into his lung. How he could even talk was beyond her.
"I am going to balefire Ishamael," she hissed as she crossed the clearing to Restore Asmodean. He let her do so without a word. "Have a care I don't do it to you first. Trying to hide something like that, for the love of the Light!"
Asmodean brushed her hands off once the Restoring was done. He was upset over something. "How much do you remember of the time you spent under the influence of Compulsion?" he asked softly. Softly was how the tiger's paws padded just before it pounced.
"Almost nothing," Kiara replied. "Why?"
Asmodean touched a spot on her shoulder, near the end of her collarbone. She looked down, puzzled. And wished she had not. There, on her fair skin, was a bite mark. An unmistakeably human bite mark. It was red. Recent.
"Do you remember this?" he asked.
Kiara could not take her eyes off the mark, though looking hurt her neck muscles. After a long moment she forced herself to meet Asmodean's gaze. She flinched a little at the heat in them.
"No," she answered him truthfully.
"Try."
Some of the fiery temper that she had had as a girl came back to Kiara, and she took a firm step back from him, fists clenched at her sides. "No."
"Why? Are you afraid of what you might remember?" he asked. Heartlessly.
"And what is the point?" Kiara retorted, her voice raised. "And I don't remember anything."
"I just want to know what you let him do to you!" he exploded, icy façade shattering completely.
"What I let him do?" Kiara snapped. "That is it. I am not talking to you until you start to make some sense." She turned her back on him, refusing to let the tears fall. There was nothing worth crying about.
The clearing was silent for a long time. Kiara turned back a fraction, just to look. Asmodean was gone. Disgusted, she made a gateway back to her chambers. Ilyena was there, looking frantic.
"What happened?" her friend asked the moment she stepped through. "You've been missing for three days."
Kiara looked at Ilyena's concerned expression and smiled wanly. "I just felt like getting a little breathing space. I'm sorry I just vanished, but … I was just going crazy. I had to … go."
Ilyena smiled understandingly. "Yes, of course. Lews Therin will be glad to know that you are back. And there is something disturbing going on. It seems that the Forsaken are gathering in an attempt to take us here at Paaran Disen," she said. "He needs all the powerful channelers up front and centre. And you're among the strongest that we have."
Kiara thought about it for a moment before nodding. "I don't really want to, but there are always things you have to do that you don't want to."