Tatewaki Kuno strode down the streets of Nerima as if he commanded them. He was a man bent on a mission decreed by heaven itself. The fiend Saotome had abducted the fair Akane Tendo. And the pig-tailed girl had also disappeared. It all must lie at his treacherous feet.
And so he walked with the grace and poise of true nobility towards the home of Akane Tendo. The hated Nabiki Tendo had informed him that the Amazon were attempting to rescue Saotome, but might leave Akane wherever Saotome had spirited her. Using beguiling speech, she had told him that no one but he could be certain to make sure that Akane was also rescued.
Tatewaki Kuno laughed, scaring the ignorant peasants around him. Yes, he would rescue Akane Tendo and the pig-tailed girl. But he would leave Saotome to rot in whatever prison he had concocted for their tortures. It would be a most fitting end to his most hated foe. His new sword was just in case he needed to deal with Ranma Saotome personally.
Kodachi Kuno followed from a distance, on the roofs, as was her wont. "Oh, dearest brother," she said with great venom, "I shall make sure that my darling Ranma is rescued and that witch Akane Tendo is never seen from again. I can see the subtle manipulations of the mercenary Nabiki Tendo. She is using you. I must save him!"
Nabiki sipped at her tea and looked at the clock one more time. Cologne had called to say they would be here later in the afternoon. It was probably going to be some sort of demand, that if she rescued Ranma and Akane, that Shampoo's claim of marriage be given the preeminence.
She snorted to herself. All she wanted was her sister back. If that was what it took, then so be it. But it was always useful to have an ace up her sleeves, so to speak. She hadn't been able to get a hold of Ryoga. But Ukyo and the Kuno's would both be here soon. Nabiki smiled to herself. She was sure that Cologne would show early and make her demands. She was going to throw a wrench in her plans by having extra players in the game.
Someone knocked at the front door. Automatically, Kasumi stood up to answer it. "Why hello, Cologne. Shampoo, Mousse. Welcome to our home!" Kasumi exclaimed brightly.
Nabiki tallied the time and how long it would take Kuno and Kodachi to get here. Perfect.
Cologne hopped into the living room and looked around. "Ah, the elders of the Saotome clan are here. We must have words, before I send Shampoo to rescue her husband."
Ukyo sniffed. "Oh, this is the part where you demand that Ranma marry Shampoo, or you won't use the 'ancient Amazon treasure' to rescue him."
Cologne glared at the impertinent girl and turned to receive very harsh glares from Nodoka, Genma and Soun. This could be harder than she thought, she realized glumly.
"Ranma must marry to continue the dojo! The Tendo's claim is preeminent!" Soun shouted, his face distorting into a hideous demonic mask and seemingly growing to an alarming size. His tongue lashed the air, causing Shampoo to jump back protectively, clutching at something around her neck.
Even Mousse stepped back. He had no idea that the Tendo Patriarch had such a devastating technique in his repertoire! It was just blunted enough by his bad sight that he was able to step in between Soun and Shampoo.
"Ho ho ho ho ho! So that is where it is!" Kodachi cackled, snapping her ribbon at the unprepared Shampoo. Nabiki smiled in the background. Perfect timing, again.
Cologne was caught up in Soun's attack and it took a moment for the words to reach her consciousness. "Stop her you fools! That is irreplaceable and the only hope of bringing Son-in-law back!"
Kodachi cackled gleefully. "Do you mean this little trinket? I think I will keep it and rescue my darling Ranma for myself!" Shampoo clutched at her neck reflexively. It was gone!
"Nay, not so long as I have breath, demented sister. I, Tatewaki Kuno, shall rescue my beloved Akane Tendo and the pig-tailed girl. And banish the wretched Saotome to the darkest pits of hell!" Tatewaki yelled out, charging his sister from the open door.
Maybe this was just a little too much, Nabiki thought to herself.
"Don't break! Necklace very fragile!" Shampoo yelled out. She charged toward the psychotic gymnast. She was back peddling frantically from Kuno's sudden multi-strike attack with a real sword.
"None but myself must have the necklace! Get thee hither, treacherous Amazon!" Kuno yelled out. His eyes were alight with the fires of determination.
Shampoo managed to avoid the worst of it, but got tangled up with Mousse and Cologne and a slash across her cheek.
Suddenly, Nodoka was standing next to Kodachi, her hand out. "Please, give it to me. Let me bring back my son, my manly son." The emotion that filled her voice pulled at Kodachi's heartstrings.
Kodachi nodded slowly, the pain of losing her own mother suddenly vivid in her mind. Slowly, she handed the amulet to Nodoka.
"NEVER!" Tatewaki Kuno yelled out. The chance that Ranma Saotome might be returned pushed him beyond reasoning. He was the best again! There was no one to ridicule him and call him fool. He struck with his entire being. Never a faster blow would he strike again. The amulet exploded into shards from the hit.
The three who had come into contact with the amulet, their thoughts and hearts focused on one individual (in whatever form), controlled the raw magic that was released. A blinding burst of light filled the room, stunning all who were present.
When the light cleared, now another three had disappeared.
"Oh my!" Nabiki said eloquently.
Kasumi blinked at her younger sister.
Ranma returned to consciousness slowly. She seemed to be snuggled up to something warm and fragrant. Slowly her eyes took in the sleeping face in front of her. Her mind was muddled, but she did remember the changes in their relationship. Akane loved Ranma and that was all that was important.
Slowly, Ranma kissed Akane. Akane's eyes opened in alarm for just a moment and then relaxed. This was new territory, but she recognized Ranma in the darkness. He must be feeling better. And, oh Gods, it felt so good. Ranma loved her. Not Ukyo, not Shampoo, nor even any other girl. Ranma Saotome loved Akane Tendo and wanted to marry her. She deepened the kiss even further, as her hands started slide up and down Ranma's back. It slowly seeped into her mind that something was wrong.
Akane broke the kiss suddenly. "Ranma," she hissed quietly, "you're a girl. What do you think you are doing?" Old reflexes took over for just a second.
Ranma patted herself, accidentally brushing up against Akane's bosom. "I'm sorry, I didn't check when I woke up. I just really missed cuddling."
That accidental touch had done nothing to stem the feelings in Akane. She took a deep breath and then answered Ranma, "That, that's all right Ranma. I missed cuddling too. We don't have to quit, if you really don't want to."
"B-but I'm a girl right now!" Ranma whispered loudly.
"Shush." Akane took a breath and then continued more quietly, "You're Ranma, that's all that is important. A-a-and I haven't cared about your curse in a long time." Well, except for the fact that 'she' looked better than herself. She had always known that it was possible that Ranma might never be cured. And might even be locked into her cursed form again.
Indecision warred on Ranma's face and in her heart. "Are you sure?"
Akane answered the gender confused individual with a long and passionate kiss. Slowly, Ranma started to respond. She might be confused by her change, but that didn't change her desires for Akane. If it was all right with Akane, then it had to be fine. Didn't it?
Tears were released from fears that had proven to be founded on fears alone. Ranma held herself close to the girl that she loved. The girl that had just proved that it didn't matter what form she took, she would love her no matter what.
Nodoka groaned and lifted her head from the cold soil. She blinked painfully, hearing the gurgling of water nearby. She took in the shore and the two individuals that were near her. Slowly, she raised herself up and finally stood up.
She glared at the young man who had caused the predicament. She nudged him awake with her foot. "Wake up!"
Tatewaki Kuno stirred himself awake and blinked at the older lady who was looking at him in displeasure. She bore a striking resemblance to his pig tailed love.
Nodoka turned away and walked over to where the leotard wearing girl lay on the ground. She seemed to be very pale and was cold to the touch. Nodoka leaned over to her and shook her awake.
Kodachi blearily opened her eyes and took in the view of Ranma's mother looking at her, worry evident on her continence. "What happened?" Kodachi managed to get out.
"I'm not certain. We are definitely not at the Tendo Dojo anymore. What was the last thing you remember?"
"My idiotic brother smashing the necklace. Where are we?" she asked shakily.
"We appear to be in the wilderness, next to a very large river. I think it is dawn, so we seem to be on west bank, I would guess."
"Hark, we must have been sent to the same lands as the accursed Saotome!" Kuno shouted as he levered himself to his feet. "The Vengeance of Heaven is surely come upon him!"
"So where are they?" Kodachi asked, looking around.
"Young man, I am a Saotome! I would ask that you treat me with the respect of your elder." Nodoka glared at the rude boy.
"Pardon, my fair lady. I shall give you that courtesy, even though I know you to be the mother of the wretched Ranma Saotome," Kuno said as he sheathed his sword.
"'Wretched Saotome?' And what did my son do to deserve to be called so?" Nodoka asked. She was wondering if he had learned more of Genma's bad manners than she had been told.
"He has ensorcelled the fair Akane Tendo and bewitched the pig tailed girl."
"I was not aware that Ranma knew of any magic." Nodoka arched her left eyebrow at the raving Kuno.
"Aye, for how else could he keep the fierce and independent Akane under his beguilements? And how else could he be of one heart, one body with the pig tailed girl?" Kuno said smugly.
Kodachi glared at her ranting brother. Even she knew that the pig tailed girl hated her brother with a passion. One easily understood. "Nay, brother. I think you can not admit that they both spurn you and would do almost anything to be rid of you."
Nodoka looked over at the girl. "So this 'pig tailed' girl has spurned him?" One relief in this strange conversation.
"Oh, yes. You can see the revulsion on her face. I might hate her for defeating me and laying low my honor, but even I wouldn't curse her with my brother. Uh, to be related to her even so sends shivers up my spine. She must not pollute the proud heritage of the Kuno clan."
"That won't happen. I can guarantee that she will never marry that young man." Nodoka said absently. She looked at the poor chilled girl. She looked very cold.
"Guarantee? Why is that?" Kodachi said, gritting her teeth from the cold. She shivered strongly all of a sudden.
"Why, the pig tailed girl is Ranma, of course. Don't you know about his curse? And it would not be very manly of my son to marry him as a girl," Nodoka said primly. Something would have to be done to warm her up. Luckily, Nodoka was wearing a spare layer with her kimono.
She fixed a glare at Tatewaki and told him, "Turn around, young man!"
Tatewaki and Kodachi gaped in astonishment. "What do you mean?" Kuno managed to get out.
Nodoka blinked. "Ranma has a curse that turns him into a girl." Was he really that dense? Even she had eventually figured out Ranma's curse by herself. Ranma had a very large interest in making sure that she had not found out about the curse.
Kodachi blinked. That would explain a few things that had always confused her. Especially why 'she' would have used her darling Ranma's name in the tournament from so long ago. So it hadn't been a hallucination that time in her house. She'd always worried that she was starting to slip, seeing her one true love turn into that harridan. A curse, hmm?
"Lies! His foul sorcery has clouded your mind also! I would not have thought him capable of using such magic on his own mother, but I see that his evil know no bounds!"
Kodachi looked at Nodoka closely. She even looked somewhat like the pigtailed girl. She started to laugh loudly, "Hahahaha, oh hohohohoho. Oh, how humorous. I can see it, now that it has been explained. How very silly of me." She covered her mouth decorously.
"What, surely you do not buy into this insane musing of the heathens mother?" Kuno asked in surprise.
"It does fit with what I remember and know. I've hated the man I love, as the woman who defeated me. What delicious, bitter humor."
"I will not stand here and listen to your lies anymore." Kuno stalked off in a huff.
Nodoka shook her head. She reached for her sash and undid her outer layer of her kimono. "Here, take this. It should keep you a bit warmer."
"Why, thank you, Mrs. Saotome. Please forgive my boorish brother. He lives in his own little world. I fear that it is a failing of all in the Kuno clan."
"You seem like a nice enough young lady." Nodoka smiled and thought; such a pretty thing too.
"Ah, if only my darling Ranma believed so. But I fear he finds no attraction to me."
"Surely my son is attracted to such a beautiful girl such as you?" Nodoka frowned.
"Such a man is he, that he swept me off of my feet and took my heart. I've pined only for him in my dreams. But he has eyes only for another. And I have no candle to hold against his love, that is a bonfire for her. But yet I dream of a day that he might smile for me, that I may be the one that lights his eyes up."
Nodoka smiled. "You are talking about Akane, aren't you?"
Reluctantly, she replied, "Yes. I do not understand why he does not love me. After all, I am the more comely lass, the richer and the more gently raised, as are all who are of nobility. But still his eyes only turn for that peasant."
"But he has to marry her, for the honor of the Saotome clan and the Tendo clan. But don't fret, dear girl. There may yet be hope. For if he is truly manly, he is too much of a man for any one girl."
Kodachi blinked and then smiled shyly. Maybe Ranma's mother was right. And having someone like his mother on her side? Well, that would be lovely!
Egwene looked around, as she rode stable old Bela down the shallow valley. It had been hard going these last few days. Food was scarce and they had seen not a sign of habitation. They turned a corner around some bushes and the smell of food cooking wafted to their noses.
Perrin nodded a second and then turned to Egwene. "I'll go take a look. Maybe they'll spare us some food."
Egwene nodded and slid off of the saddle.
She was waiting just a moment, when she heard the sounds of horses coming up the path behind her. She looked around in panic for just a moment, until she spotted familiar figures perched on the horses.
"Nynaeve! Moiraine!" Egwene called out. Perrin turned around and trotted back
Moiraine smiled and waved. Just as she had suspected. The young girl was up here with the lone boy. "So, do you have any doubts, Nynaeve?"
Nynaeve gnashed her teeth. "No. It doesn't matter. I'll never be a filthy Aes Sedai like you."
"You will never have the strength to defeat me, unless you too go to Tar Valon. Besides, you must admit that you knew that was going to be Egwene before we saw her?"
"Yes. Damn you. Yes."
"Charming reunion. A Warder, an Aes Sedai and young children alone out in the wilderness." This gruff voice came from the side, where a figure stood in the small concealment of the bushes.
Lan's hand flashed to his sword, stopped only by his view of the creatures that had surrounded them. Wolves and how many of them.
"Give me one good reason why I shouldn't kill you all. Especially you, Aes Sedai." The strange and bearded man looked them over as you would a side of beef.
"We are no threat to you and mean no harm," Moiraine said calmly.
His eyes flashed a strange gold. "Of course not. Are you going to drag me off to be stilled, because I am different?" the man said quietly, mockingly. The hint of menace in his voice was clear.
"I am not of the Red Ajah. And who would you be? And why would you fear stilling?" Moiraine asked calmly.
"What Ajah are you?" the man said suspiciously.
"I am of the Blue Ajah."
"You have come a very far distance to hunt children, Aes Sedai of the Blue Ajah. Meddler of fate."
"I seek to thwart the Dark One's design."
The man started suddenly. "Really? And these children are that important?"
Carefully, she nodded. "Yes."
"And my stopping you would make me a friend to the Dark Ones minions, wouldn't it?" A curt nod was her only response. "I am Elyas." Lan started suddenly, looking the man over closely. "I see that you recognize me, Lan."
"Indeed. It has been a long time since the name Elyas has been heard. An honorable man, from what I remember."
"And what are you called, Aes Sedai?"
"I am known as Moiraine Sedai." She casually pulled her cloak to ward off the cold chill. "The name of Elyas is also known to me. A man who thinks of himself as Wolfbrother and who hunts with wolves."
"And you aren't wishing to geld me? I am impressed," Elyas said dryly.
"I care nothing, except for the safety of the boy and the girl."
"Really? Then we seem to be at an impasse. I have the strength of my friends, but you are unrestricted in the use of the One Power. How shall we avoid this conflict?"
"You were a Warder, at one time, Elyas. You know that the evil we fight must not win," Moiraine said softly.
A flash of anger ran through Elyas. "You butchered Jilian, because you were afraid of me. Because you were afraid of what changed me!"
"Not I. The Red Ajah was behind that." Moiraine's face was calm and collected.
"You could have stopped them!"
"No, that was impossible. The Red Ajah is very strong. Now especially, with all of the False Dragons. We live in momentous times, Elyas Wolfbrother," Moiraine said casually, maintaining her haughty non-expression. She was a bit distracted, trying to consider how to get to the other boys who were still on the river.
"Soon you will be saying that the Dragon has been reborn. Tell me that he has not been reborn, Aes Sedai," Elyas said mockingly. The pain coated his acrid words.
Moiraine stood still for a very long moment. She wrestled with how best to not say something. She had not been prepared to foil that particular question right then.
She paused just a moment too long, for the man jumped to a staggering conclusion.
"Tell me plainly it is not so, Aes Sedai!" he shouted. Fear laced his angry words. Fear that he might have tumbled to the truth.
Another pregnant pause and she then replied softly. Damnation. If she did not answer, the truth would be known any ways. So she would tell the truth then, if they could bear it. "I can not." The truth, even if they couldn't.
Nynaeve sucked in a sharp breath. Light defend us. Aes Sedai can not lie. They can not!
"Light!" Elyas said softly. The wolves around him started to howl.
The cold chill of the frost seemed to settle in Nynaeve's bones. That was what an Aes Sedai and the Dark One were hunting in drab little Edmonds Field.
The Dragon! The Dragon Reborn! It truly was the end of the world!
Rand shivered, as he awoke in the cold morning. They were supposed to be getting to Whitebridge today, or tomorrow early. And for once, he had actually awoken before his new 'sensei'. Ranma and her fiancée had been a lot more comfortable with each other for the past few days. He frowned at that. They had been sharing their bed roll again each night; obviously something was going on there.
But, he noted to himself, nothing too much. He blushed as he realized that he himself had only kissed Egwene once or twice. And they were probably more intimate than that already.
"Up and at 'em, you guys!" Ranma said cheerfully.
Rand looked over at the red headed girl. It was hard to see her as a guy, until she opened her mouth. If she didn't have such a girlish figure, you wouldn't even notice her cursed form.
Mat cursed from his corner. Once he had gotten better, Ranma had drilled him mercilessly to catch him up to Rand's level. He had not liked it one bit and become a bit surly about the whole thing. Ranma had ignored his attitude entirely.
Soon all four of them were on the deck in the early morning light. Akane watched from her the front of the ship, while Ranma went over the mornings lesson with the two. Ranma was a tireless taskmistress, but very exacting and seemed never pleased enough with their progress. She had them practicing against each other today, while distracting them with small pellets or rocks.
This went for about an hour, until Ranma blinked in surprise at Akane. She had been in a meditative lotus position for the entire time, staring at her open palms. Suddenly, a flicker grew around her for a few seconds and then quit just as suddenly.
Rand and Mat looked at Ranma in surprise at the sudden stop in distractions. "Ranko? Are you alright?" Mat asked.
"Ah, yeah. Akane just surprised me is all."
"What the great Ranko, surprised by me?" Akane said sweetly.
"Hey! It ain't my fault you're so uncute that you stop traffic at fifty feet!" Ranma put her hands on her hips.
"What did you say, Ranko? Would you care to repeat that?" Akane bounded to her feet. She put her hands up in a ready position.
"Ha. You heard me! Besides, I'm not scared of you!" Ranma was interrupted by a sailor's shout.
"Whitebridge! Whitebridge ahoy!" the sailor in the crows nest called out. He was shading his eyes and looking down the river. The captain would be pleased.
Ranma leaned over the side of the ship, but didn't see anything. With a bound, the girl leaped to the crows nest and shaded her own eyes to get the best view. "What's that going across the river?" Ranma asked the sailor on watch.
Akane fumed for just a second and then went back to her studies. She'd show Ranma. Once she figured out how to Channel, Ranma would sing a different tune!
The sailor started at the unexpected question. Wasn't she down on deck just a moment ago? "That's Whitebridge. It's been standing there for over a thousand years."
"And they haven't replaced it? That's pretty good!"
"Replace it? Its unbreakable, girl. It'll stand until the end of time."
"You're kidding, right?"
"No, I'm not! It is truly unbreakable. Nobody could destroy it, even if they wanted to. It's from the Age of Legends, when such things were common. It's thousands of years old and it has nary a scratch."
"Wow."
Soon the ship docked at the quay. Domon then made his appearance on deck. "Floran Gelb, get you mangy hide up here. I said that you'd be off my ship at Whitebridge and I meant it. You can either walk or be thrown off. The choice is yours."
Gelb snarled impotently and then took a leap off to the dock. He was soon lost in the crowd.
Domon then turned to his passengers. "I still don't trust you five. I've done my job, now please leave my ship. I want no more to do with you and your strange ways."
Thom bowed and responded, "You have been most kind to unwanted people. Your crew was the height of civility."
"Whatever. You paid, so I did my job. That's enough."
And with that, they took leave of the ship 'Sea Spray'.
Nodoka walked at the side of the wagon, continually looking around as the wagon master had asked. She could hear Tatewaki Kuno on the far side, bemoaning the injustice of being a plebian guard, when he should be treated according to his rank. "Oh, the things that I must endure to free you, Akane Tendo." He had learned not to talk of the pigtailed girl around the matriarch of the Saotome clan.
Kodachi couldn't really do much more than drive the wagon (which she showed little aptitude at) and clean the dishes that the wagoneers made at each meal, because she had no shoes or boots. She was quite glad for the wagon though, as her feet were cut badly on the sharp rocks.
Nodoka fingered the hilt of her sword, glad that she had at least some small skill with the weapon. Tatewaki had impressed Madomia with his skill and so won them a job with the caravan.
Nodoka shivered to think what would have happened if they hadn't met up with these rough bitten men. At least they had some honor. They were traveling down this road, bringing finished metal goods from a city to the west. In perhaps a week or so, they would be at the caravan's destination, the city of Whitebridge. They rarely saw a farm on their lonely trek.
"Hold. What do you think, Belos?" Madomia asked. He peered ahead with his keen eyes.
"It could be bandits. I didn't think we would get this far without running into some."
"Kuno, go earn your meal and see if that is an ambush."
Kuno suppressed a snarl and started to walk towards the bushes that they suspected the ambush to come from. His right hand was rested easily on his sword, ready to draw it in a moment. He paused when he heard swearing.
From out of the bushes, a ragged band of men scrambled out, twenty in all. Kuno stood his ground calmly. Over half of them raised their crude bows at him, while the others targeted the well prepared caravan. With a resounding twang, they released their missiles.
With one clean stroke, directly from his sheath, Kuno blocked and cut every single arrow that was shot at him. With a suddenness that was shocking to the bandits, Kuno charged the lot of bandits all by himself.
They unleashed another volley, fired entirely at the errant swordsman, which was as easily dealt with as the first one. Kuno was then among them, a gray and blue blur, striking death wherever he stalked. One man managed to start running away before he had killed all of them.
Tatewaki Kuno nodded sagely at the sign of a true coward. He sheathed his sword after spinning it once to get rid of the blood. With his toe, he flipped a bow and the arrow that was laying on it into his waiting hands. Taking his time, he pulled back the western-style bow with his considerable strength, unleashing the arrow into the bandits back.
Dropping the bow, he walked back to the caravan. He took up his position on his side of the wagon. "Twas but a moments work. The way is clear," Kuno said with a strange gleam in his eyes. That was what battle was meant to be, not guns and tanks as from their era. Real blood and sweat!
Madomia didn't respond for a second. Licking his dry lips, he finally responded, "Very good. There will be an extra reward for you, when we get to Whitebridge."
Kuno inclined his head in acknowledgment.
Ranma stretched out, looking over the small city that they had just debarked off to. "Anybody up for some real food? I'm sick and tired of that slop that the Sea Spray served." It was even worse than what Akane made!
Rand grinned. He looked over to Thom to see what he wanted to do.
Thom grunted noncommittally. "It couldn't hurt. And one night in a real bed would be a blessing indeed."
Thom led the way. Off of the main road, he brought them to an inn. Letting their eyes adjust, they waited at the door to see what was inside. A large fireplace, well stoked, met their gaze and warded off the chill. A well polished bar was up against one wall with a stout man standing behind it. A man who brightened up immediately when he saw Thom was entering into the inn. His gaze only flickered to the others for just the briefest moments.
"Thom! You old dog! I haven't seen you in a Kings age, it feels like. Looking for a place to eat and spend the night?"
"As always, Petrim! I'll have to work for my room this time. I've fallen on to a bit of hard luck. And just after I took these two boys under my wing."
"Ah, another charity case? You too good for you own well being, you know that? Of course you can stay. Welcome to the Cheery Wick Inn!"
Ranma sighed in contentment. "That hit the spot." She pushed her plate away from herself.
Akane looked over at her for just a second. "That really wasn't that much food. Are you feeling all right?"
Ranma snorted. "I only eat that much at home because I can, Akane. You eat good when you can for the lean times. Now's the lean times."
Akane blinked. Somehow that seemed to be right. A nagging feeling impinged on the back of her consciousness.
Rand glanced at the door over Ranma's shoulder, a frown showing on his face. The door opened silently, a darkly cloaked figure back-lit by the bright sunshine. More figures could be seen behind it.
Ranma's neck hackles raised themselves. She spun around, knocking her chair out of the way. Her sword spun in an arc, knocking a thrown dagger out of the air and into the ceiling.
With a voice that sounded like crumbling marble, the figure said in the sudden awful silence, "Kill everyone but the boys." A black sword that dripped darkness appeared in its hand. With a startlingly surety, everyone at the table knew that the figure was a Fade.
"A Fade!" Thom yelled out, "Run! I'll hold it off!" Screams from the patrons filled the air, as they tried to leave the building by any means possible.
Ranma's face curled into a snarl. "Not in a million years!"
Windows shattered, as torches flew through them, flickering in the air. One unfortunate man was struck in the head. His hair caught fire and he started to scream. Other fires caught around the room.
Ranma caught a glimpse of bows being drawn back behind the Fade, by a group of hard looking men and women. They were pointed at the windows. "Follow me!" she yelled. And with that she charged the Myrddraal, blade flickering back and forth, trying to break its defenses.
Ranma had become quite attuned to her blade in the past weeks. It was almost an extension of her arm now. The creature found itself on the defensive and never once came close to attacking her effectively. Ranma smiled tightly. "Hah! Hah! Hah! Hah!" she yelled out suddenly, as her sword became a blur.
Nicks and cuts appeared all over the front of the Fade. It staggered and its guard dropped. In that moment, Ranma swung his sword around in a tight arc, twice. Once for its head and the second time for its sword arm, both of which fell to the ground with a thud.
After the short nasty fight, Ranma then charged out into the street. A handful of yen appeared in her free hand. With flicks of her wrists, each coin snapped a bow string. The Darkfriends were suddenly weaponless. There morale broken, they turned and fled.
"You stole Kuno's technique!" Akane said, disdain evident in her tone of voice.
"Um? So? Besides, I improved it!" Ranma shot right back.
"Don't you guys ever quit arguing?" Rand asked rhetorically.
"No!" they snapped at him, going back to their yelling match.
"You guys sound like you're already married," Matt said impishly.
"We do not!" they yelled out at the same time. They locked gazes with each other. Blushes crept over their faces. They suddenly became interested in anything but each other.
"There they are! The ones that brought the Dark One to Whitebridge!" A man shouted from down the road. A large crowd was swirling behind him. Makeshift weapons and the occasional sword could be seen.
An old man in the background suddenly yelled out, "Let's burn them! Purify them in the Light! We should get the Whitecloaks to come here!"
An angry undercurrent swelled beneath the surface of the mob.
"Um, guys? We might want to run." Ranma looked around nervously. The alley seemed to be the best bet to get out.
"Couldn't you take them easily?" Mat asked, his sharp nose twitching in Ranma's direction.
"There are enough of them that I wouldn't be able to stop them all while they killed you. Do you really want to die today?" Ranma glanced nervously at Akane.
"Why don't you just do a Hiryo Shotan Ha? That would take them all out," Akane asked perplexedly.
"Um, I didn't want to mention it, but my ki attacks aren't what they used to be. I don't understand it. It's like there's not enough power."
"So? Run!" Rand yelled out, following his own advice.
The ran and scurried through the darkness, trying to lose their pursuers. Thom called out to them softly, "Get to Caemlyn! Go to the Lion and the Stag! Don't worry about me, I'll be all right!" He disappeared into the shadows after thrusting his small bundle of belongings into Rand's waiting hands.
"Good riddance!" Mat said loudly.
"Oh, hush! Should we do what he said?" Rand asked Ranma.
"I guess. It's gonna be real tough to travel there if we got people on our tails the whole way there. Maybe Thom was gonna distract them or something."
"I hope so!" Akane said fervently. She turned and followed Rand down the road.
Moiraine sat easily on her saddle. Lan led the way through the plains towards Caemlyn. Her thoughts were wandering, at least to the other two boys. They had left the river and were heading north. She had changed their direction so that they would hopefully intercept them soon.
Behind her came Nyaeve, Perrin and Egwene kept to themselves. They had been traveling for the last few days through bleak plains that were slowly turning into barely rolling swells. The Tuatha'an encampment was far behind them.
Perrin was hunched as he walked along, thoroughly miserable. Only Moiraine had treated him the same, not letting him out of her sight for the time being. He almost always refused to ride Bela, even when offered by Egwene.
Though, he mused to himself, Nynaeve had seemed more preoccupied by something else rather than actively worried about the Dragon Reborn being one of their companions. He'd seen her looking off in the distance, thinking deep thoughts.
What did she know that he did not?
Moiraine's eyes drifted across the horizon, trying to spot Elyas Wolf-Brother and his wolves. Drat that man. Now there were five too many people that new that she hunted the Dragon. The two young women had agreed, reluctantly, to not tell anyone about why Moiraine was looking for these three boys in particular. Elyas had not, as she had suspected he would act. That left Perrin and Lan, of course. Lan was trustworthy, of course.
And Perrin? Perrin had his own reasons to keep quiet.
Poor Perrin. Moiraine thought as her eyes drifted to catch sight of him. He looked so miserable. His whole life had been turned upside down, under just the suspicion that he might be that one. The Dragon Reborn. None of his friends were willing to talk to him anymore, nor was he wanting to speak to them. She frowned as she saw him jerk and stare off in the distance.
Following his gaze, she saw a wolf, standing still and almost invisible. It seemed to be staring at the stocky man. The wolf suddenly stared at her with unnerving, golden eyes. In a moment, it disappeared, in an area where she would have sworn that only field mice hidden itself.
A while later, her eyes attention was grabbed by a fluttering figure, landing in a small black tree a ways off. A chill went up her back, as she realized that the tree was only black because of the crows that hung from it. Her eyes scanned the area alertly, seeing more signs of the Dark One's minions.
A subtle hand sign brought Lan to her side. "Crows by the score follow us. Be prepared to head out swiftly, on my command."
Lan nodded grimly. Normally, such birds would be nothing and would not dare follow those who served the light so fervently. But if the Dragon was reborn, all rolls of the dice could fall. Including that his servants would gather in great enough numbers to attack Tar Valon itself. His thoughts shifted for a second to the sharp-tongued Wisdom of Edmond's Field. He shook his head to clear the unusual distraction.
An hour later, even the least observant of their group had noted the flocks of black birds following them. They slowed at one point, to converse about their danger and what actions needed to be taken.
"Well, Aes Sedai, I would think such creatures would flee from you and you mighty powers," Nynaeve heckled as she flicked the reigns of her horse to the side, trying to hide her fear.
"I have no time for your silliness, Nynaeve. The most dangerous of the Dark One's minions are not all humans. A rat or a crow can be infinitely more dangerous, when you least expect it." Moiraine's icy tones cut quicker than the chill wind.
Nynaeve jerked her ponytail nervously. She opened her mouth, but decided against saying anything. This was far too tangible of evidence of the Dark One's existence than she felt comfortable with.
Moiraine waited a moment and then continued on. "Lan and I shall do our best to protect you, of course. We are not far from a stedding." She pointed off in the distance. "No creature of the Dark One will dare to enter it, so that at least is a good thing. If I tell you to run, run you shall, on this course. Egwene, you shall ride with Lan. Stout Bela can carry Perrin easily, at least for that distance."
"I should stay, they want me! Not any of you," Perrin said vehemently.
"I shall not allow that, even over all of our dead bodies! If, and I say if, you are the Dragon, your life is more important than any king, queen or even the Amyerlin Seat herself. I will not allow you to fall to him!"
Perrin's face went pale as it seemed he had been struck an under handed blow. He opened his mouth, but no words came out. He ducked his head in shame. This was such a terrible, terrible burden!
They stopped just a moment to put Perrin on Bela. Egwene was just getting on the saddle behind Lan, when the flapping of thousands of wings gave them their only warning. All of their eyes were drawn towards the blotches in the sky that were suddenly arrowing towards them.
"Run! Flee now!" Moiraine screamed out. She started to spin her staff, its tips igniting in the cold air. "Get them to safety, no matter the cost, Lan!"
Lan didn't give Perrin the time to argue, slapping Bela with the flat of his sword. Perrin let out a cry and grabbed at the reigns desperately. Soon all of them save Moiraine were galloping across the sloping lands, headed towards the vague promise of safety. An ominous cloud of dark birds grew behind them.
Moiraine's mind worked feverishly, trying to find some way to stop this insidious attack. And survive, she thought ruefully. Thunder off in the distance, under the cold, gray clouds grabbed her attention. Some sort of powerful weather attack?
Wait! Yes! Maybe! The crows were only seconds away, sharp claws and beaks moved in anticipation of rending soft flesh. The wind picked up around Moiraine, as she sat calmly on her horse. Brown grass fluttered and then was smashed flat as Moiraine became the center of a powerful vortex of hot and cold flows of Air, held together by tenuous weaves of Spirit.
Wider and wider it spun, as the spinning column of air rose higher and higher. Squawks of distress could be heard faintly over the roaring of the wind. The tornado struck the cloud of crows, smashing the hapless bird into each other, destroying the unity of their attack with an insane frenzied power that sent them flying away in fear.
Moiraine tried to break herself free of the flows of power desperately. It was growing too quickly, too strongly! With a cry of dread, she was pulled off her horse and flung into the air.
Perrin watched from the woods as the strange spinning cloud broke up broke up far in the distance. "What was that?"
"Eh?" Lan asked, as he was distracted from the scene by the question. "That was a tornado."
"Oh! I've heard of those. They can destroy whole villages and towns!" Egwene said with awe. "But I thought they were just stories!"
Lan stared at them for a moment. "Not just stories. But I've only heard of them in the flatlands."
"Lan, what about Moiraine?" Perrin asked suddenly.
"As soon as you are safe in the stedding, I will return with her. Come, the sooner we are off, the sooner I can be back to Moiraine." He could feel pain through their link, but pain was good, for it signaled that she was still alive. For how long tormented him.
Perrin opened his mouth to argue, when he felt a sudden foreboding, a pressure that pushed him forward. Almost as if he were guided by some other force, he turned and nodded.
Hours later, Lan suddenly turned to them. "We are here. Egwene and Perrin, you will stay here until we return."
"We?" Nynaeve asked.
"Yes, you will come with me. Moiraine is injured and needs your aid."
"How do you... Why should I help that witch?" she spat out scathingly.
"How uncharitable. I thought you were a Wisdom, not a child." Lan could have been talking about the weather for the blandness of his voice.
Nynaeve jerked as if slapped across her face. Her face held little expression as her mouthed moved, unable to form any words. "Fine," she said finally.
"Elyas Machera, I know you hold no love for the Aes Sedai. But this matter is far too important to hold old grudges against all of the Ajahs. Moiraine is of the blue, not the red. We must trust her in this matter." Lan's eyes stared intently into the wild man's golden eyes.
"I will do this... Until you return. I do this because of our old friendship. And because I too live in this time."
It had been three days since they had last seen Thom. Even with Ranma, Rand and Mat's hunting acumen, they had eaten only twice in that time.
Ranma's nose twitched. Was that cooking she smelled?
"That smells like stew," Mat said, drooling a little. Off in the distance, a large farmhouse lay nestled in a copse of trees. Several buildings, including a barn, lay clustered around the lands. A couple of small children could be seen playing with a large hound.
"Ain't going to be able to steal their stew. But I bet I can get a few chickens," Ranma said, her hunger layering her words heavily.
"But they've got dogs!" Rand protested. He'd been tempted himself, yesterday, to try his hand at thieving.
"Heh, just makes it more interesting. Look, you guys go ahead. I'll catch up in an hour or so."
"Ranma? Are you sure?" Akane asked quizzically.
"We need food." Ranma looked ashamed for a second. "This isn't the first time that I've done this. Pop hasn't always been able to earn our food. And since I was smaller, I was, uh, better at stealing stuff."
"I knew you weren't a saint, Ranma. Go ahead. We'll have a fire ready to cook the food." Akane hugged the slightly smaller girl, startling her.
Ranma seemed to follow a minute later, slipping into the shadows of the brush.
Ela shaded his eyes with a grizzled hand as he watched the latest band of people walking down the road. Just kids, he thought sadly. Desperate kids, he was sure.
Still, he'd had little luck feeding his own family in this thrice cursed weather. Planting while the ground was still frozen was insane, but what else could he do?
"Jaed? I think I'd better stay near the house," Ela said, nodding to his oldest son just a dozen feet away.
Jaed nodded back, having seen the strangers himself. "Go ahead, Pa. I'll be fine."
Ela trudged back to the house, taking a moment to scratch behind the ear of Yeaoden. "You children go on, get inside and help Granny cook lunch. Yeadon, git. Come on boy, we gotta watch for some more people."
He spent the next five minutes walking around the house and barn, looking carefully in between sheds for an intruder. Unfortunately, he had never run into someone like Ranma, or he would have checked his roofs too.
Ranma waited a long time carefully for the old man to go into the house. She cursed silently as he told the dog to guard and sent it off by itself. Agonizing minutes passed, when the dog finally passed out of sight. Her toes rustled the ground in front of the chicken pen. She squeezed into it and stopped.
"Damn. Only ten chickens?" Ranma muttered to herself. The chicken coop was built to handle far greater numbers. This farm was barely making ends meet. And from the comments that Rand and Mat had made, this was common. Winter wouldn't let go its icy grasp.
She grabbed the oldest and scrawniest rooster and three eggs.
Her head poked out for just a second, seeing the dog heading this direction. Using her native speed like her father had shown her against Kumon, she literally moved faster than the eye could follow. In just a few bounds, she was running down the road to catch up to the group.
Elyas Machera stared into the fire, two wolves on the edge of his consciousness. The two teenagers that shared the fire with him were characteristically quiet. It had been most of a day since Lan and Nynaeve had left to go back for Moiraine. The wolves snapped to attention. Elyas eyes were as riveted as theirs. "The fire! Put out the fire!"
He and Perrin scrambled to put out the fire, bumping a kettle to the side in their haste. The fire's light was lost into the oppressive darkness. Perrin could feel Hopper out there; feel his anger at the men on horses. "There are many men coming here!"
The man-wolf pulled out his dagger, snarling ferally. "Perrin, get Egwene out of here. Hopper and I will distract them."
Perrin grabbed the bridle of Bela and looked back to make sure that Egwene was following. For a long while, the scrambled around in the darkness, trying to keep moving away from the men. He could feel the wolves palpable hatred for them men and their horses. Their horses were harried and driven back, but always they could see torches far off in the distance, checking the area.
"Perrin!" Egwene called out softly.
"What?"
"Where are we going? Who are they?"
"I... don't know." Perrin paused, for once in the last few weeks too busy, too engrossed in the problems of the present to worry about the future. "They're getting closer." With that he turned and looked around, the world only a little dim from night light.
Egwene stared at the small points of torchlight in the distance. The darkness seemed to enclose her. How could Perrin see to get around in this dark night. "So, what will we do?"
"We'll hide in here," he declared.
"Where?" she asked, almost in a panic.
"In the hand of Artur Hawkwing," Perrin said as he smiled mirthlessly, leading Bela into the area under the gigantic fingers. He helped her down and situated themselves back, listening to the sounds of movement outside. He couldn't help but look out every once in a while, seeing the randomness of the torch movement.
On his fifth time, he frowned in thought. "They're going to find us soon!"
As if his words were a cue, a voice called out. "I told you I saw something!" Around a small hillock, as band of Whitecloaks appeared, Perrin's heart turned as if it into ice. He shifted his stance, his sweaty grip tightened on the cold haft of his ax.
"Come on out! Now!" barked the leader of the band of Whitecloaks. He waited a second and then finally ordered, "Bring them to me alive."
A snarl almost erupted from Perrin's throat, low and wolf-like. The man in front of him coolly carried his sword, unworried by the bared steel in his opponent's hands. He blocked the first dazzling blow, but didn't see that it was feint. The ax ripped a deep gouge into his stomach and then his throat.
The rest of the fight was a haze of red, his heartbeat thudding to unswayable rhythm of battle and death.
"I still think that this unseemly fear and terror be the work of thine infernal son," Kuno espoused to his sister and his hated enemy's mother. How strange it was to be traveling with her. And how strange her delusions, that Ranma Saotome and the pigtailed girl were one and the same, via some strange Chinese curse.
"Oh, hush, brother of mine. Mrs. Saotome, do you really think this dress suits me?" Kodachi asked. She spun around to show off the skirt, much to the delight of the inn's patrons.
"I despise you."
"Of course, dear. You are just a slight bit too pale to wear those dark colors that you seem to like. Soft yellows, reds and blues will make you look so much more alive." Nodoka didn't even deign to acknowledge Kuno, as she saw him to be quite rude.
"I'll take your word for it, of course."
"Ah, if only I could see my treasured loves again. Sweet, pure Akane and the healthy Pig-tailed Girl..." Kuno sighed in suppressed sadness.
"Pig-tailed girl?" one of the many patrons asked.
"Aye, short of stature, but healthy of figure. Her crimson hair be bound up in small ponytail oft referred to as a pigtail."
"We don't take with those sort of folk here. They brought the Dark One to Whitebridge!"
"Nay! She can not be of evil design! She may have fallen in with that nemesis of all that is good, but she herself is pure and unsullied. It is the duty of all Samurai to protect and rescues damsels that are in distress." Kuno's katana was unsheathed in an eyeblink. "I'll bring about his death and none shall dismiss my claim of his evils."
All of the people within the inn blinked in surprise. They weren't quite sure what to make of the stranger's rants, but he seemed quite skilled with that blade. The man who had confronted them spoke up again, "She was run out of town. Headed north. Probably still running, if she knows what's good for her."
"Yes! Run, Pig-tailed Girl! Flee Saotome's grasp so that I may yet rescue you!"
"Kuno."
"Yes, Mrs. Saotome?"
"What did I say about talking like that?"
"I'll refrain from talking about the villainous Saotome in front-guh!" Kuno's ramblings were cut off as Kodachi slammed a stout wood chair over his head.
Looking quite angelic, Kodachi turned to crowd. "Please forgive my brother's prattling. He's a little soft in the head."
Ranma mopped her brow of sweat. She must be getting out of shape if chopping wood was getting to her.
"Ranma, why don't you let me cut wood for a little while?" Akane asked. She had already rolled up her shirt's sleeves in readiness.
Ranma thought about it a second. Her sweating so much could be because of her recent sickness. "Sure, I guess." She handed over the ax to her fiancée.
Akane went to work with a will. It had taken Ranma about fifteen minutes to train her to properly cut wood, but she had gotten much better since then. Using the axe was more inconspicuous.
"I wouldn't have believed it if I hadn't seen it myself," a young woman's voice gushed in amazement.
"Hello, Else! Wouldn't believe what?" Ranma asked.
"You've done two full cords of wood already and Akane looks like she's going to try to cut even more!" Else shook her head in amazement. "Pa says to finish up soon, supper's on and Rand is already finished repairing that fence."
"Yo, Akane, you hear that?"
"I heard!" Akane hung up the ax on the tool shed.
In just a few minutes, they were sitting at the dinner table. Ranma noticed that Else seemed somewhat fascinated with both Rand and herself. To break that fascination, Rand took out Thom's flute and played a few jigs. Mat and Ranma both juggled, while Akane showed that she had some skill with singing.
At the end of the night, the parents seemed quite surprised that the two girls seemed to want to sleep away from the two boys in their own privacy.
The next morning, they were on the road fairly early after a substantial breakfast. At Rand's suggestion, they tried to pay for their meals and board by entertaining at different inns. This worked for about a week.
Until Four Kings. At Four Kings, things changed.
This ratty little town boasted several inns, as it seemed to on some sort of trade route. Inn after inn, they found entertainers of higher quality distractions than they could provide.
Ranma couldn't even remember the name of the inn they finally ended up. Rand had convinced the inn keeper to let them earn a meal. As Rand was taking a break, he sat next to Ranma. Akane was sitting up next to Mat, singing a little ditty while he threw balls into the air with a dizzying confidence.
"Ranko, I'm really starting to get worried about Mat. He isn't acting normal," Rand said finally, leaning close to whisper into her ear.
Ranma looked over at Mat, really watching him for the first time in weeks. She hadn't really thought about his surly attitude, but then, she didn't really know him too well anyways. As he finished juggling, she saw him reach under his jacket, resolutely fingering the dagger hidden there. His attitude seemed to be one of barely controlled contempt and anger. "Yeah, he's acting funny."
"I... think it may have to do with the dagger he found. At that place."
"What dagger? Where?" Ranma asked.
"Hey! I'm not feeding you if you don't entertain!" bellowed the inn keeper. He almost smiled to his customers. His inn was already packed.
"I'll tell you later." Rand reached for Thom's flute.
"Let me do something. The innkeeper's been staring at our swords. I think he wants to rob us." Ranma stood up, rearranging her clothes to accentuate her appearance just a bit.
"Whatcha going to do, girl?" one of the patrons asked as they saw her walk onto the tiny stage.
"In the lands I come from, they dance with swords. Watch and be dazzled!" Ranma cried out. Several of the customers booed in response. "Akane! Rand! A beat please!"
They answered by slapping out a rhythm on their legs, Mat slowly joining in. Ranma slowly sauntered across the stage, back and forth without even pulling her sword. The dance seemed to be a mix of Indian/Arabic dancing, mixed with a sweeping arm motions.
The patrons blinked in surprise at the lithe, exotic moves. Between one step and another, her sword appeared in her hands. Polished brightly, it spun a blinding dance of steel around her. She slapped her feet the last two steps like they'd planned and then stopped, Rand and Akane timing their beat to end at the same moment.
Rand bounced to his feet, pulling out the flute. He didn't show it, but he was very glad when he saw the slack-jawed amazement of the innkeeper. He'd think twice about robbing them. As he was sitting, he saw a well dressed man enter the taproom. He stood out among the throng of wagoneers and farmers, his silks looking out of place in the peeling room.
He looked around and then started. In moments the unknown man had found himself a place to sit. Cries from the audience suddenly grabbed his attention.
"I'm telling you what I heard. They said that strange man that you spotted went to every single inn in the town. Himself!" Mat exclaimed, throwing wary glances at the two weird foreigners that they traveled with.
"Do you really want to head out into that rain?" Rand responded.
"Hell, no!" Ranma said loudly. "I want to sleep somewhere warm!"
"We'll leave early, in case it's one of those people that are hunting us," Rand decided. He was glad they had already found those carpenter shims. They were able to wedge them into the door, effectively locking it.
Akane nodded in agreement. "That's a good idea."
They were interrupted by a knocking on the door. They all looked over in consternation.
"I wish to speak to the boys. Privately! Open up!" The voice oozed culture and refinement.
"We're going to bed." Rand stood up and belted his sword on. He'd checked the window, finding it barred. The only way out of the store room was through that door.
"I wanted to spare the girls, but their deaths are on your heads. Come now, boys! Open the door. This barrier won't protect you from the Dark One. And what he wishes, he takes."
The four youngsters felt fear clam up in their chests.
"We want nothing to do with Darkfriends!" Rand yelled back. Where was the innkeeper? He'd had a burly guard watching their door earlier. A tightness started to build in his heart. They were going to die here, far from friends and family.
"Why don't I just take him out?" Ranma asked, popping her knuckles. It had been days without a real fight. She was getting edgy.
"If that is the way you want to deal with it!" the ominous noble replied.
"What about his guards? He might have one of those things that followed us out of Two Rivers! Or a Fade!" Mat said. "We aren't all amazing warriors that can face down evil like you do!"
That stopped the young aquatransexual. Her glance flickered over to her fiancée. Akane might be able to kill a Fade, but he didn't like the odds of it. "I..." Her fear for Akane's safety redoubled itself, becoming a thudding, demanding presence in his heart.
The suddenly slamming of bodies into the door made the group jump in surprise.
"We're going to die!" Mat bemoaned.
The air seemed to become thicker than molasses, movements and actions muted under a strange lassitude. A strange sense of immensity seemed to loom ahead of them. Sudden danger flared into Akane's sense, sending her diving to the side.
Night turned to blinding day as an immense bolt of lightning smashed through the window and through the door, right between Rand and Ranma. The thunder smashed into their senses, deafening everyone and knocking them to the floor.
"Light! What was that?" Mat cried out. He'd been looking right at the window, hoping for some sort of escape.
Rand groaned and stood up. He felt like he'd been being trained by Ranma all day. "I'm not sure." He was still blinking the spots out of his eyes.
Ranma was doing the same thing. "That was really freaky." Her eyes started to take in the room again. She staggered almost drunkenly. What was wrong with her? She felt like she'd been training under Happosai for a week.
"Can someone light a candle or something?" Mat asked
"Um, I'll see if I can find something," Akane replied. Lightning flashed off in the distance; strobing for a long second. "It's going to be really tough to find anything in the dark."
Thunder rumbled in from the distance.
"I say we'd better leave. It shouldn't be too tough by the light of the next lightning bolt."
Lightning struck again, further away. It still illuminated the room brightly.
"Great. We're going to have to wait until it does, huh?"
"Mat... It already has. Twice." Rand felt a sense of dread invade his heart.
"What? But... I haven't seen..." Mat started to wave his hand frantically in front of his nose.
Even in the dark, the other three youths could see his actions.
"I can't see anything! I'm blind!" Mat cried out.
"We've got to leave!" Ranma said intently. She was standing by pure willpower alone. Rand didn't look much better, she noted.
"I'll guide you, Mat," Akane said as she gripped his hand.
Finally, they had made it Caemlyn with only one near encounter of Darkfriends. The woman had attempted to kill them in their sleep, but Akane had scared her off at sword point.
Although Ranma wondered if it were the sword or something else. The woman had been terrified of something. But Ranma had a distinct worry that it had something to do with those mists reacted to Akane. She shook her head suddenly as Rand's comment impinged on her again. "I guess we could do some colored ribbons to cover that symbol on your hilt," she replied. She glanced around the street and the open front stores.
"Red or white?" Mat asked. He had the wide-eyed look of a country bumpkin getting his first taste of a real city.
"It looks like red is cheaper," Akane noted. "Should we all do that with our swords?"
Ranma took a look around. Everyone seemed to have the ribbons on their swords. Something about it struck her odd, but it didn't quite register to her that everyone seemed to be congregating by colors. "Sure."
In moments their three swords were all bedecked with ribbons.
Mat almost seemed jovial today. "So, we're off to the Queen's Blessing?"
Akane nodded. "That was the place that Tom mentioned to go to in Caemlyn, wasn't it?"
It took several hours of wandering and asking questions, but they eventually found the nice inn. Entering, the four of them looked around to take in the nicely maintained main room.
The man behind the bar seemed to be looking over them closely. "Welcome to the Queen's Blessing. I'm Basil Gill, the master of the establishment. How may I help you this day?" His eyes seemed to be noting their beribboned swords.
Everyone in the group looked at Rand. "I'm Rand Al'Thor. A friend of mine suggested that I use this inn while I waited for some friends."
Master Gill just smiled. "Does your friend have a name?"
"Oh, I'm sorry! His name is Thom-" Rand started to say.
"Probably better to not finish that. If that's the Thom I think it is, it would be better if it wasn't known," Master Gill interrupted quickly. "He's a friend of mine, of course. And a friend of Thom's is a friend of mine, of course. I don't suppose you can pay for your stay?"
"We have a little money and we'd be willing to work and entertain. Thom taught us a little bit of the Gleeman's trade," Rand explained.
"All of you?" Master Gill asked, looking at Ranma and Akane.
"We're from a far off land and traveling with Rand and Mat. Women could be entertainers from our lands, which seemed to intrigue Master Thom," Akane explained. She bowed to him really quickly.
"Really? That would have intrigued the old coot," the innkeeper said. "Well, let's see about getting you some rooms."
Ranma awoke from being shaken by Akane.
"Come on, Ranma! That False Dragon is going to be shown around town today as a victory for the Queen of this country," Akane said.
"Too early. Goway," the red-haired girl mumbled.
"I want to practice before we go and see the parade!" She tried shaking the other girl again, to no avail. "Fine, be that way. Ah-yup!" She spun and flipped the sleeping girl right out the window and into the small stable area.
Ranma bounced off the hard ground, now very awake. "Hey!" She rolled out of the way of Akane's follow up attack. "Oh yeah! I'll show you!"
Up in his room, Rand just grabbed his pillow to cover his head. He was going to cherish every moment he had of his sleep.
From the back door, Master Gill watched the two young warriors throwing punches and kicks in a frenzied blur. They were some of the most amazing people he'd ever seen with the way they could fight. In the fighting arts, it was obvious that Ranma was the teacher, while the other three teenagers were the students.
After about a half an hour, Rand dragged Mat down for their own punishment. Er, training. At the end of their hour of grueling training, they were let go. Rand decided to head off into the city, while Mat in a irritating funk just went back to bed.
Akane cleaned herself up and put on a dress, a rarity since she'd visited this land. Ranma cleaned up in Rand and Mat's room and changed genders, much to his relief. He'd been feeling less phobic about the curse, but he still didn't like it. And he was hoping for some cuddling later that day.
"Ready, Ranma?" Akane asked.
Ranma smiled and nodded. His fiancée looked pretty good, he thought to himself. He just wished he was better at telling her without it coming out wrong.
A while later, they were on the crowded streets of Caemlyn, trying to find a good place to watch the procession.
"This isn't working, everyone's too tall!" Akane complained.
"Yeah. How about we find someplace higher up?" the boy looked up intended path of the procession. "What do you think?"
"I'm in a dress, Ranma! I'm not climbing any walls!" she snapped back.
"That's because your thighs are too thick and your too slow and-" Bingo! She took the bait, just like he'd expected.
"Ranma! How dare you! Come back here so I can pulverize you!" Akane screeched as she ran after the rapidly retreating form. Oh no he wasn't going to get away! No way was he going to get out of this beating!
The left the crowd behind in moments, heading in the direction that Ranma had pointed to a moment ago. "Naya! Can't catch me, Tomboy!"
Said 'Tomboy' didn't realize it, but they had left the ground to leap to the top of the short buildings on their way. Up ahead of her, Ranma spun around and stopped while holding up his hands defensively. "Akane wait!"
"Why? Afraid to take your lumps like a man?" she snapped hotly. She slowly, and with menacing intent, continued to walk towards him across the top of the thick stone wall.
"Naw! It's just that we can see the parade perfectly from up here!" he said happily and pointed below them.
Akane fumed for a moment, but she acquiesced to his good mood and sat next to him on the wall.
They didn't have to wait long to see the parade move into view. Ranma was struck by how unbeaten the False Dragon was, even under all of the chains he was wrapped up in. His gaze was hot and angry as he looked over the jeering crowds. Surrounding him sat women in shawls, ignoring the crowds utterly. The Aes Sedai's Warders, on the other hand, looked ready to attack the entire city and win a battle, here and now!
Slowly the procession moved to the edge of their view, when they heard a loud yell and thudding sound from behind them. They blinked and looked at each other.
"Hey, Rand? What are you doing here?" Ranma asked as he looked at the mussed up young man below him getting to his feet. It looked like he had fallen from the same wall he was on, just from further along the wall, where a tree blocked their view. "Jeeze, I'm going to have to reteach you how to land."
Akane just giggled.
"More people? Would you mind coming down here?" an unknown young woman's voice asked from just out of sight. From the tree that Rand had fallen through, a young woman in a very ornate dress climbed down.
Ranma shrugged. With one hand, he flipped himself up and around, spinning acrobatically. Akane was a little more demure as hopped down while trying to keep her skirt from flying up.
A blonde haired young woman was standing over Rand in the yard he had fallen into. It actually looked like a garden, now that Ranma thought about it. Behind her stood a tall fellow with very good looks who had also just climbed down from the tree.
She looked quite startled by his landing. "And who are you people?" she asked. She appeared to be quite pretty, her dress mussed in places. A smudge of dirt dabbed her cheek.
Ranma puffed up his chest. "I'm Ranma Saotome!"
Akane promptly deflated his chest with an elbow. "I am Akane Tendo. Pleased to meet you."
"Er, Rand Al'Thor, my lady." The tall lad from the country seemed to be out of sorts around the pretty girl. The small scrape at his head was mostly ignored. He'd have hated to have hit his head harder.
"And what were you doing up there?" the young man asked intently.
"Oh, we were just seeing the False Dragon," Ranma replied helpfully. "You could get a great view from the wall."
"Oh, I do know that. Mother wouldn't allow us to see the False Dragon," the girl said.
"Which is why we of course had to climb that tree, right Elayne?" the young man said calmly.
"Oh? Who is your mother?" Rand asked. He felt a little prickle of worry, all of a sudden.
Elayne's eyes widened in surprise, but Gawyn spoke in an ordinary tone that made his words all the more jarring. "Morgase, by the Grace of the Light, Queen of Andor, Protector of the Realm, Defender of the People, High Seat of the House Trakand."
"The Queen?" Rand managed to utter out.
"And you do sound like an Andorman, though your accent is a strange," Gawyn mused to himself. "Where do you hail from, Rand al'Thor?"
"Edmond's Field, in the Two Rivers," he replied thickly.
The young lord looked surprised at that. "To the west, far west indeed. Tabac and wool come from that region, from what I remember of my studies. It's said Two Rivers people are stubborn. They can be led, if they think you are worthy, but the harder you try to push them, the harder they dig in. Elayne ought to choose her husband from there. It'll take a man with a will like stone to keep from being trampled by her."
Elayne did not look happy at that comment, but was interrupted by a new voice.
"What is this?" the very handsome, almost pretty man said. He took them all in with his sweeping gaze. "Stand away from these people, Elayne. You too, Gawyn."
The Daughter-Heir stepped in between the newcomer and the strangers to Caemlyn with supreme confidence. "He is a loyal subject of our mother, and a good Queen's man. And he is under my protection, Galad."
"I am aware of your fondness for strays, Elayne," the slender man said reasonably, "but these people are armed, and they hardly look reputable. In these days, we cannot be too careful. If they're loyal to the Queen, what are they doing here where they do not belong? It is easy enough to change the wrappings on a sword, Elayne."
"Hey! We haven't done nothing!" Ranma shouted right back. Something about this fellow rubbed him the wrong way. Just like Taro Pantyhose, if he'd thought about it.
"They are here as my guests, Galad, and I vouch for them. Or have you appointed yourself my nurse, to decide whom I may talk to, and when?"
Galad seemed to look them all over. "I see I won't be able to convince you of this. Gawyn, perhaps you could help convince her that this is not right?"
Gawyn just gave a look as if to say that he had no control and why was he being asked.
Ranma just looked flatly at Galadedrid with a look that promised pain, but did not argue when they took his sword. The guards poked him in the back and got him moving forward. In moments, they arrived in the throne room.
Galad bowed, in all formality yet with the grace of a cat, took a step back, then turned and strode down the paved path, his long legs carrying him quickly out of sight beyond the arbor.
"I hate him," Elayne breathed. "He is vile and full of envy."
"There you go too far, Elayne," Gawyn said. "Galad does not know the meaning of envy. Twice he has saved my life, with none to know if he held his hand. If he had not, he would be your First Prince of the Sword in my place."
"Never, Gawyn. I would choose anyone before Galad. Anyone. The lowest stableboy." Suddenly she smiled and gave her brother a mock-stern look. "You say I am fond of giving orders. Well, I command you to let nothing happen to you. I command you to be my First Prince of the Sword when I take the throne - the Light send that day is far off! - and to lead the armies of Andor with the sort of honor Galad cannot dream of."
"As you command, my Lady." Gawyn laughed with his bow a parody of Galad's.
"Now we must get you out of here quickly." Elayne looked over the hodge-podge group.
"Galad always does the right thing," Gawyn explained, "even when he should not. In this case, finding a stranger in the gardens, the right thing is to notify the Palace guards. Which I suspect he is on his way to do right this minute."
Suddenly they heard boots pounding toward them over the slate paving stones.
"Too late," Gawyn muttered. "He must have started running as soon as he was out of eyeshot."
Elayne growled an oath; Akane's and Rand's eyebrows shot up. They had both heard that one from the stablemen at The Queen's Blessing and had been shocked then. The next moment she was in cool self-possession once more.
Red-uniformed men burst into sight, breastplates catching the sun as they dashed up the path. Others came like breaking waves of scarlet and polished steel, seemingly from every direction. Some held drawn swords; others only waited to set their boots before raising bows and knocking feathered shafts. Behind the barred face-guards, every eye was grim, and every broadhead arrow was pointed unwaveringly at the three intruders.
Elayne and Gawyn leaped as one, putting themselves between the group and the arrows, their arms spread to cover them all. Rand stood very still and kept his hands in plain sight, away from his sword. Ranma appeared to be relaxed, but Akane knew that he was as tense as the bowstrings pointed at him.
While the thud of boots and the creak of bowstrings still hung in the air, one of the soldiers, with the golden knot of an officer on his shoulder, shouted, "My Lady, my Lord, down, quickly!"
Despite her outstretched arms Elayne drew herself up regally. "You dare to bring bare steel into my presence, Tallanvor? Gareth Bryne will have you mucking stables with the meanest trooper for this, if you are lucky!"
The soldiers exchanged puzzled glances, and some of the bowmen uneasily half lowered their bows. Only then did Elayne let her arms down, as if she had only held them up because she wished to. Gawyn hesitated, then followed her example. Rand could count the bows that had not been lowered. The muscles of his stomach tensed as though they could stop a broadhead shaft at twenty paces. He didn't think he was up to parrying arrows as Ranma boasted that he could do.
The man with the officer's knot seemed the most perplexed of all. "My Lady, forgive me, but Lord Galadedrid reported dirty peasants skulking in the gardens, armed and endangering my Lady Elayne and my Lord Gawyn." His eyes went to Rand and then Ranma, and his voice firmed. "If my Lady and my Lord will please to step aside, I will take these villains into custody. There is too much riff-raff in the city these days."
"I doubt very much if Galad reported anything of the kind," Elayne said. "Galad does not lie."
"Sometimes I wish he would," Gawyn said softly, for Rand's ear. "Just once. It might make living with him easier."
"This man is my guest," Elayne continued, "and here under my protection. You may withdraw, Tallanvor."
"I regret that will not be possible, My Lady. As My Lady knows, the Queen, your lady mother, has given orders regarding anyone on Palace grounds without Her Majesty's permission and word has been sent to Her Majesty of this intruder." There was more than a hint of satisfaction in Tallanvor's voice. Rand suspected the officer had had to accept other commands from Elayne that he did not think proper; this time the man was not about to, not when he had a perfect excuse.
Elayne stared back at Tallanvor; for once she seemed at a loss.
Rand looked a question at Gawyn, and Gawyn understood. "Prison," he murmured. Rand's face went white, and the young man added quickly, "Only for a few days, and you will not be harmed. You'll be questioned by Gareth Bryne, the Captain-General, personally, but you will be set free once it's clear you meant no harm." He paused, hidden thoughts in his eyes. "I hope you were telling the truth, Rand al'Thor from the Two Rivers."
Another red-uniformed soldier came running down the path, skidding to a halt to salute with an arm across his chest. He spoke softly to Tallanvor, and his words brought satisfaction back to Tallanvor's face.
"The Queen, your lady mother," Tallanvor announced, "commands me to bring the intruder to her immediately. It is also the Queen's command that my Lady Elayne and my Lord Gawyn attend her. Also immediately."
Gawyn winced, and Elayne swallowed hard. Her face composed, she still began industriously brushing at the stains on her dress. Aside from dislodging a few pieces of bark, her effort did little good.
"If My Lady pleases?" Tallanvor said smugly. "My Lord?"
The soldiers formed around them in a hollow box that started along the slate path with Tallanvor leading. Gawyn and Elayne walked on either side of Rand, Ranma and Akane, both appearing lost in unpleasant thoughts. The soldiers had sheathed their swords and returned arrows to quivers, but they were no less on guard than when they had had weapons in hand. They watched the trio as if they expected him at any moment to snatch their swords and try to cut their way to freedom.
"It's green," Rand suddenly whispered. "Green." The soldiers muttered to themselves; Tallanvor gave them a sharp look over his shoulder and they fell silent.
"Elaida's work," Gawyn said absently.
"It is not right," Elayne said. "She asked if I wanted to pick out the one farm she could do the same for, while all around it the crops still failed, but it still isn't right for us to have flowers when there are people who do not have enough to eat." She drew a deep breath, and refilled her self-possession. "Remember yourself," she told Rand briskly. "Speak up clearly when you are spoken to, and keep silent otherwise. And follow my lead. All will be well. "
Rand wished he could share her confidence. It would have helped if Gawyn had seemed to have it as well. As Tallanvor led them into the Palace, he looked back at the garden, at all the green streaked with blossoms, colors wrought for a Queen by an Aes Sedai's hand. He was in deep water, and there was no bank in sight.
The path Tallanvor took turned so many times that Rand lost his sense of direction. Finally the young officer stopped before tall double doors of dark wood with a rich glow, not so grand as some they had passed, but still carved all over with rows of lions, finely wrought in detail. A liveried servant stood to either side.
"At least it isn't the Grand Hall." Gawyn laughed unsteadily. "I never heard that Mother commanded anyone's head cut off from here." He sounded as if he thought she might set a precedent.
Tallanvor reached for Rand's sword, but Elayne moved to cut him off. "He is my guest, and by custom and law, guests of the royal family may go armed even in Mother's presence. Or will you deny my word that he is my guest?"
Tallanvor hesitated, locking eyes with her, then nodded. "Very well, my Lady." She smiled at Rand as Tallanvor stepped back, but it lasted only a moment. "First rank to accompany me," Tallanvor commanded. "Announce the Lady Elayne and the Lord Gawyn to Her Majesty," he told the doorkeepers. "Also Guardsman-Lieutenant Tallanvor, at Her Majesty's command, with the intruders under guard."
Elayne scowled at Tallanvor, but the doors were already swinging open. A sonorous voice sounded, announcing those who came.
Grandly Elayne swept through the doors. Gawyn squared his shoulders and strode in flanking her, one measured pace to her rear. Rand followed with Akane and Ranma behind them, uncertainly keeping level with Gawyn on her other side. Tallanvor stayed close to them, and ten soldiers came with him. The doors closed silently behind them
Suddenly Elayne dropped into a deep curtsy, simultaneously bowing from the waist, and stayed there, holding her skirt wide. Rand gave a start, then hastily emulated Gawyn and the other men, shifting awkwardly until he had it right. He and Tallanvor exchanged looks of anger after a while. Ranma and Akane duplicate the bows as best as possible.
The square chamber was about the size of the common room at The Queen's Blessing, its walls presenting hunting scenes carved in relief in stone of the purest white. The tapestries between the carvings were gentle images of bright flowers and brilliantly plumaged hummingbirds, except for the two at the far end of the room, where the White Lion of Andor stood taller than a man on scarlet fields. Those two hangings flanked a dais, and on the dais a carved and gilded throne where sat the Queen.
A bluff, blocky man stood bareheaded by the Queen's right hand in the red of the Queen's Guards, with four golden knots on the shoulder of his cloak and wide golden bands breaking the white of his cuffs. His temples were heavy with gray, but he looked as strong and immovable as a rock. That had to be the Captain-General, Gareth Bryne. Behind the throne and to the other side a woman in deep green silk sat on a low stool, knitting something out of dark, almost black, wool. At first, the knitting made Rand think she was old, but at second glance he could not put an age to her at all.
There was no sound in the room except for the click of her needles
"You may rise," Morgase said in a rich, warm voice that held Elayne's assurance of obedience a hundred times over.
"Mother - " Elayne began, but Morgase cut her off.
"You have been climbing trees, it seems, daughter." Elayne plucked a stray fragment of bark from her dress and, finding there was no place to put it, held it clenched in her hand. "In fact," Morgase went on calmly, "it would seem that despite my orders to the contrary you have contrived to take your look at this Logain. Gawyn, I have thought better of you. You must learn not only to obey your sister, but at the same time to be counterweight for her against disaster." The Queen's eyes swung to the blocky man beside her, then quickly away again. Bryne remained impassive, as if he had not noticed, but Rand thought those eyes noticed everything. "That, Gawyn, is as much the duty of the First Prince as is leading the armies of Andor. Perhaps if your training is intensified, you will find less time for letting your sister lead you into trouble. I will ask the Captain-General to see that you do not lack for things to do on the journey north."
Gawyn shifted his feet as if about to protest, then bowed his head instead. "As you command, mother."
"I have seen this fellow Logain from close, and he is dangerous, child. Caged, with Aes Sedai to guard him every minute, he is still as dangerous as a wolf. I wish he had never been brought near Caemlyn."
"He will be dealt with in Tar Valon." The woman on the stool did not take her eyes from her knitting as she spoke. "What is important is that the people see that the Light has once again vanquished the Dark. And that they see you are part of that victory, Morgase."
Morgase waved a dismissive hand. "I would still rather he had never come near Caemlyn. Elayne, I know your mind."
"Mother," Elayne protested, "I do mean to obey you. Truly I do."
"You do?" Morgase asked in mock surprise, then chuckled. "Yes, you do try to be a dutiful daughter. But you constantly test how far you may go. Well, I did the same with my mother. That spirit will stand you in good stead when you ascend to the throne, but you are not Queen yet, child. You have disobeyed me and had your look at Logain. Be satisfied with that. On the journey north you will not be allowed within one hundred paces of him, neither you nor Gawyn. If I did not know just how hard your lessons will be in Tar Valon, I would send Lini along to see that you obey. She, at least, seems able to make you do as you must."
Elayne bowed her head sullenly.
The woman behind the throne seemed occupied with counting her stitches. "In one week," she said suddenly, "you will be wanting to come home to your mother. In a month you will be wanting to run away with the Traveling People. But my sisters will keep you away from the unbeliever. That sort of thing is not for you, not yet." Abruptly she turned on the stool to look intently at Elayne, all her placidity gone as if it had never been. "You have it in you to be the greatest Queen that Andor has ever seen, that any land has seen in more than a thousand years. It is for that we will shape you, if you have the strength for it."
Rand just stared at her uncertainly.
"Enough, Elaida," Morgase said, frowning uneasily. "She has heard that more than enough. The Wheel weaves as the Wheel wills." For a moment, she was silent, looking at her daughter. "Now there is the problem of these youngsters" - she gestured to them all without taking her eyes off Elayne's face - "and how and why they came here, and why you claimed guest-right for them to your brother."
"May I speak, mother?" When Morgase nodded her assent, Elayne told of events simply, from the time she first saw Rand climbing up the slope to the wall. He expected her to finish by proclaiming the innocence of what he had done, but instead she said, "Mother, often you tell me I must know our people, from the highest to the lowest, but whenever I meet any of them it is with a dozen attendants. How can I come to know anything real or true under such circumstances? In speaking with this young man I have already learned more about the people of the Two Rivers, what kind of people they are, than I ever could from books. It says something that he has come so far and has put on the red, when so many incomers wear the white from fear. Mother, I beg you not to misuse a loyal subject, and one who has taught me much about the people you rule."
"A loyal subject from the Two Rivers." Morgase sighed. "My child, you should pay more heed to those books. The Two Rivers has not seen a tax collector in six generations, nor the Queen's Guards in seven. I daresay they seldom even think to remember they are part of the Ream." Rand shrugged uncomfortably, recalling his surprise when he was told the Two Rivers was part of the Realm of Andor. The Queen saw him, and smiled ruefully at her daughter. "You see, child?"
Elaida had put down her knitting, Rand realized, and was studying him. She rose from her stool and slowly came down from the dais to stand before him. "From the Two Rivers?" she said. She reached a hand toward his head; he pulled away from her touch, and she let her hand drop. "With that red in his hair, and gray eyes? Two Rivers people are dark of hair and eye, and they seldom have such height." Her hand darted out to push back his coat sleeve, exposing lighter skin the sun had not reached so often. "Or such skin."
She looked at the exotic looking pair. "And these are also from the Two Rivers?"
Ranma suddenly shook his head vigorously. "We're travelers, actually."
"We met Rand in Two Rivers and traveled with him here," Akane explained. "Our lands are very far away."
"I was born in Emond's Field," Rand said stiffly. "My mother was an outlander; that's where my eyes come from. My father is Tam al'Thor, a shepherd and farmer, as I am."
Elaida nodded slowly, never taking her eyes from his face. He met her gaze with a levelness that belied the sour feeling in his stomach. He saw her note the steadiness of his look. Still meeting him eye to eye, she moved her hand slowly toward him again. He resolved not to flinch this time.
It was his sword she touched, not him, her hand closing around the hilt at the very top. Her fingers tightened and her eyes opened wide with surprise. "A shepherd from the Two Rivers," she said softly, a whisper meant to be heard by all, "with a heron-mark sword."
In two quick strides Gareth Bryne was at the front of the dais, between Rand and the Queen.
Elayne herself looked at him as if she were seeing him for the first time. Morgase did not change expression, but her hands tightened on the gilded arms of her throne.
"Surely," Morgase said, her voice level, "he is too young to have earned a heron-mark blade. He cannot be any older than Gawyn."
"It fits. I don't understand, but all of these... children could carry a heron-marked blade."
The Queen looked at him in surprise. "How can that be?"
"I do not know, Morgase," Bryne said slowly. "He is too young, yet still it belongs with him, and he with it. Look at his eyes. Look how he stands, how the sword fits him, and he it. He is too young, but the sword is his."
Galad cried out, "Surely not? He is surely not a blade master! And these younger children? Absurd!"
When the Captain-General fell silent, Elaida said, "How did you come by this blade, Rand al'Thor from the Two Rivers?" She said it as if she doubted his name as much as she did where he was from.
"My father gave it to me," Rand said. "It was his. He thought I'd need a sword, out in the world."
"Yet another shepherd from the Two Rivers with a heron-mark blade." Elaida's smile made his mouth go dry. "When did you arrive in Caemlyn?"
Rand suddenly lied, slightly surprising Ranma and Akane. "Today," he said. "This morning."
"That is very curious. What do you say? For that matter, what is you name and where are you from, boy?" Queen Morgase asked curiously.
"I am learning how to use it better from Ran-Ranma."
"Just in time," she murmured. "Where are you staying? Don't say you have not found a room somewhere. You look a little tattered, but you have had a chance to freshen. Where?"
"The Crown and Lion. I have a bed there. In the attic."
Ranma and Akane carefully schooled their faces to show no surprise at their friends sudden adroitness in lying.
"What chance this?" she said. "Today the unbeliever is brought into Caemlyn. In two days, he will be taken north to Tar Valon, and with him goes the Daughter-Heir for her training. And at just this juncture a young man appears in the Palace gardens, claiming to be a loyal subject from the Two Rivers..."
"I am from the Two Rivers." They were all looking at him, but all ignored him. All but Tallanvor and the guards, those eyes never blinked.
"That is where we met up with him," Akane tried to explain.
"Huh, didn't know that was a blade-master's sword," Ranma muttered to himself. He shrugged to himself.
"...with a story calculated to entice Elayne and bearing a heron-mark blade. He does not wear an armband or a cockade to proclaim his allegiance, but wrappings that carefully conceal the heron from inquisitive eyes. What chance this, Morgase?"
"And you are this boy's teacher? You look to be younger than him, and no seasoned warrior," the queen said as she turned to stare at the other boy.
Ranma bristled at that. "I'm Ranma Saotome of the Saotome School of Martial Arts! I've been in lots of fights! I was trained to fight since I could walk!"
"Many fights? And how many men have you killed?" Gareth asked, suddenly intent.
Ranma pursed his lips in tension. "A few. Too many."
The Queen motioned the Captain-General to stand aside, and when he did, she studied Rand with a troubled look. It was to Elaida that she spoke, though. "What are you naming him? Darkfriend? One of Logain's followers?"
"The Dark One stirs in Shayol Ghul," the Aes Sedai replied. "The Shadow lies across the Pattern, and the future is balanced on the point of a pin. This one is dangerous."
Suddenly Elayne moved, throwing herself onto her knees before the throne. "Mother, I beg you not to harm him. He would have left immediately had I not stopped him. He wanted to go. It was I who made him stay. I cannot believe he is a Darkfriend."
Morgase made a soothing gesture toward her daughter, but her eyes remained on Rand. "Is this a Foretelling, Elaida? Are you reading the Pattern? You say it comes on you when you least expect it and goes as suddenly as it comes. If this is a Foretelling, Elaida, I command you to speak the truth clearly, without your usual habit of wrapping it in so much mystery that no one can tell if you have said yes or no. Speak. What do you see?"
"This I Foretell," Elaida replied, "and swear under the Light that I can say no clearer. From this day Andor marches toward pain and division. The Shadow has yet to darken to its blackest, and I cannot see if the Light will come after. Where the world has wept one tear, it will weep thousands. This I Foretell."
A pall of silence clung to the room, broken only by Morgase expelling her breath as if it were her last.
Elaida whispered something that only Rand could hear.
"I'm a shepherd," Ran said suddenly for the entire room. "From the Two Rivers. A shepherd. "
Ranma felt as if the weight of tension would break the world as he listened.
"The Wheel weaves as the Wheel wills," Elaida said aloud, and he could not tell if there was a touch of mockery in her tone or not.
"Lord Gareth," Morgase said, "I need the advice of my Captain-General."
The blocky man shook his head. "Elaida Sedai says the lad is dangerous, My Queen, and if she could tell more I would say summon the headsman. But all she says is what any of us can see with our own eyes. There's not a farmer in the countryside won't say things will get worse, without any Foretelling. Myself, I believe the boy is here through mere happenstance, though an ill one for him. To be safe, My Queen, I say clap him in a cell till the Lady Elayne and the Lord Gawyn are well on their way, then let him go. Unless, Aes Sedai, you have more to Foretell concerning him?"
"I have said all that I have read in the Pattern, Captain-General," Elaida said. She flashed a hard smile at Rand, a smile that barely bent her lips, mocking his inability to say that she was not telling the truth. "A few weeks imprisoned will not harm him, and it may give me a chance to learn more." Hunger filled her eyes, deepening his chill. "Perhaps another Foretelling will come."
For a time Morgase considered, chin on her fist and elbow on the arm of her throne. Rand would have shifted under her frowning gaze if he could have moved at all, but Elaida's eyes froze him solid. Finally the Queen spoke.
"Suspicion is smothering Caemlyn, perhaps all of Andor. Fear and black suspicion. Women denounce their neighbors for Darkfriends. Men scrawl the Dragon's Fang on the doors of people they have known for years. I will not become part of it."
"Morgase-" Elaida began, but the Queen cut her off.
"I will not become part of it. When I took the throne I swore to uphold justice for the high and the low, and I will uphold it even if I am the last in Andor to remember justice. Rand al'Thor, do you swear under the Light that your father, a shepherd in the Two Rivers, gave you this heron-mark blade?"
Rand worked his mouth to get enough moisture to speak. "I do." Abruptly remembering to whom he was speaking, he hastily added, "My Queen." Lord Gareth raised a heavy eyebrow, but Morgase did not seem to mind.
"And you climbed the garden wall simply to gain a look at the false Dragon?"
"Yes, my Queen."
"Do you mean harm to the throne of Andor, or to my daughter, or my son?" Her tone said the last two would gain him even shorter shrift than the first.
"I mean no harm to anyone, my Queen. To you and yours least of all."
"I will give you justice then, Rand al'Thor," she said. "First, because I have the advantage of Elaida and Gareth in having heard Two Rivers speech when I was young. You have not the look, but if a dim memory can serve me, you have the Two Rivers on your tongue. Second, no one with your hair and eyes would claim that he is a Two Rivers shepherd unless it was true. And that your father gave you a heron-mark blade is too preposterous to be a lie. And third, the voice that whispers to me that the best lie is often one too ridiculous to be taken for a lie... that voice is not proof. I will uphold the laws I have made. I give you your freedom, Rand al'Thor, but I suggest you take a care where you trespass in the future. If you are found on the Palace grounds again, it will not go so easily with you."
"What of my friends?" Rand asked intently.
Ranma and Akane blinked in surprise. Everyone had been so focused on Rand, they had almost forgotten them.
"What about us?" Ranma asked with no tact.
"They are foreigners and make no pretence of loyalty to Andor," Elaida said, her eyes narrowed. "They could have duped this poor lad and tricked him into coming with them."
Morgase looked over the two darker skinned youngsters with their slightly strange eyes. "What lands do you hail from?"
"We hail from the lands of Wa, more commonly known as Japan," Akane said, ignoring the glare that Ranma shot her. "It is very far and distant from these shores."
On second thought, it would be better if he didn't say anything, Ranma thought to himself.
"Are you also farmers? Or herders of goats?" Elaida asked, as she sat back on her stool. She obviously would not expect either.
How best to explain that they were students, in terms that these people could understand? Akane had it suddenly come to her. "My name is Akane Tendo. This is my fiancé, Ranma Saotome. My father is a teacher of the sword and spear. I and my be-betrothed are to be the heirs to his lands and his school."
"Heir to a weapons-master?" Morgase asked, intrigued. She nodded at Rand for a second. "He mentioned that you were teaching him the blade? How good are you?"
Akane just smiled. "I am an accomplished warrior, but Ranma is far, far better than me. He is probably the best fighter that I've ever seen."
"He doesn't look like a blooded warrior to me!" Galad said coldly. He seemed affronted by Ranma's presence for some inexplicable reason.
"Is that a challenge?" the boy snapped right back.
"Certainly! I'll show you your place!"
"Ranma! No!" Akane cried out, suddenly worried.
"Galadedrid, I forbid this! I'm not going to let you goad this young man into a duel!" Morgase said firmly.
Gareth Bryne suddenly laughed. "Morgase, I think you had better set the terms of this duel between Galad and Ranma, else they are likely to sneak off behind your back and kill each other."
The queen pursed her lips thoughtfully. "Perhaps you are right, Gareth."
"Eh, don't worry. I won't mark him or nothing," Ranma boasted.
"Actually, I was more worried about him hurting you," she replied thoughtfully. "Very well, the first to cut the other is the winner."
The prince suddenly looked a trifle worried, as Ranma seemed to become even more confident. He brushed it off with extra poise. He was trained by Gareth Bryne, after all. "Whenever you are ready, Ranma Saotome."
Galad saluted Ranma with his sword, awaiting his response. Ranma snapped a salute with his sword still sheathed, surprising everyone present.
Akane winced at that. That meant Ranma was going to show off. Why did the dummy have to pick now of all times to humiliate this guy? He was a prince or something!
"Ha!" the royal shouted as he charged Ranma, slashing at him. It looked for a moment that he'd struck, but the afterimage of Ranma faded away. Galadedrid spun around to block Ranma's still sheathed sword.
"That just won't do!" the aquatranssexual exclaimed. "How about a lesson for free?"
Gareth suddenly snapped to a much higher state of tension. This boy was better than the prince was. Perhaps even better than himself. He put his hand on his hilt, just in case. Queen Morgase blinked in surprise at that, then in sudden worry.
"And one-two and three! And again! And faster!" Ranma said suddenly, ripping into a blindingly fast set of maneuvers. He suddenly snapped a kick that stung his opponent's thigh. "Never fall into your foe's pattern. He knows it better than you."
Elayne just stared in surprise as her half-brother was brutally outdone at every point. Gawyn just nodded, watching the fight with rapt attention. This boy was a true blademaster!
Galad's eyes were starting to get wild and angry. "You won't ever mark me if you won't draw your sword."
"I haven't finished my lesson yet," the martial artist said with smirk.
Galadedrid promised to himself that he would wipe that look off of Ranma's face if it was the last thing he did. He didn't bother to reply, as he was starting to get winded.
"There you go! You're starting to get that move!" Ranma exclaimed, easily blocking said move that he'd just shown his 'pupil.' "You're really pretty good. Not the best, of course. But not bad at all."
He would destroy that smirk, he promised to himself again.
"Of course, Rand is nearly as good as you. And I've only been training him for just a couple of months," Ranma said conversationally. "I'd like to think it's because of my training, but he's got a lot of talent, too."
Rand blinked at that. He had no idea that Ranma thought that. On the other hand, he did think that he would do all right against Galadedrid from what he'd seen.
The prince just gritted his teeth as he again tried and failed to beat his way past Ranma's defenses.
Ranma suddenly hopped backwards about ten feet and swiped his still sheathed sword at his target. "We're done now, your Majesty." Ranma then bowed to her while leaving his back open.
"What are you talking about? You haven't even... cut me?" Galadedrid suddenly looked surprised as he felt a pain in his sword-arm's shoulder. His sleeve was ripped and a small cut was now trickling blood. With his free hand, he staunched the flow of blood.
Even Akane was impressed at that. Ranma had refined Kuno's technique even further. Gareth Bryne licked his lips nervously.
"I am quite... impressed with your skill, Ranma Saotome. You are a Blade Master?" the Queen managed to say regally.
"Ah, I'm not a real master or nothing. I've only had a couple of students."
"I find that hard to believe, Ranma Saotome. Do not the people of your land gift their greatest masters with a heron-marked blade?" Gareth asked as he consciously relaxed.
Ranma just shook his head and shrugged.
"My Queen, if I may suggest? He definitely deserves the finest of such blades. And he showed great skill, there is no doubt." He left it unsaid that Ranma could have probably killed most of the people in this room, guards or not. Probably without unsheathing his sword, as he had just shown.
"He's also quite proven his boasted skills, too!" she said with a smile that took off the edge of her comment.
"Harun, please go to the armory and get my spare blade," Gareth asked one of the guards. The guard nodded, bowed to the queen and started to walk out.
"Guardsman Harun?" Morgase called out. "Bring the heron blade from my quarters instead."
Gareth looked at her with concealed surprise.
"Its closer," the queen said blandly. Not to mention that Galad should learn that there are always consequences to such hotheaded antics.
"My Queen? What is your decision about these intruders?" Elaida asked. She was unsure that she could convince Morgase to keep them here. Especially after such a stunning duel.
"They shall be released also. Ranma could have quite easily slain Elayne and Gawyn in that garden, guards or not. I feel that I can trust these people that they mean no harm to me and mine." When Elaida opened her mouth to continue to persuade her, the queen cut her off. "I will not imprison a loyal countryman, or his outlander friends that stand by his side."
"Yes, my Queen."
"You Majesty? I've, ah, brought the blade you requested." The guard quickly approached Morgase.
"Ranma Saotome, please approach." She waited until he came up. "I cannot ask for your loyalty, as I don't truly know you and you are not of my lands. But I hope you will accept this gift and my offer of friendship. You are quite an interesting young man."
"Er, thanks," Ranma said. He'd never received anything so nice. He pulled the blade just an inch and whistled.
Akane piped up, "You Majesty? May we be permitted to leave? We have a friend at our inn who might be worried about us being gone for so long."
Elaida almost rolled her eyes at that blatant attempt to get out of the palace. Obviously these... By the Light! This girl could channel! She must find out where they were staying. It was imperative.
"I can't believe you showed off like that and humiliated a prince!" Akane complained again. She fingered the ring Ranma had purchase with selling his old sword. That and some supplies had come from that little windfall.
"He deserved it! I think he wanted us thrown in prison or something."
Rand just nodded to himself in agreement with that. Elaida's words to him had disturbed him greatly. "We're back!" he called out as the three teenagers entered the Queen's Blessing.
They didn't stop to talk to the armed bouncer, petting a cat near the door. Ranma managed to squeeze by him, hoping the cat wouldn't meow. He hated showing his weaknesses.
Master Gill just nodded. "Good day. It seems you just missed a few fellows looking for you."
Ranma looked interested. "Oh?"
The owner of the Queen's Blessing wasn't sure of what to make of this Ranma that floated in and out. He'd never seen Ranko or him together, either. "Some Whitecloaks were looking for a very tall red-haired fellow and a foreign swordsman that humiliated one of the princes of the realm."
"Ah, oops?" Ranma said, just before he got bopped hard on the head.
"I told you that you shouldn't have humiliated him! He's going to make a lot of trouble for you!" she snapped.
"You are being so uncute!"
"Whitecloaks?" Rand asked, trying to divert Master Gill's attention.
"I don't think they knew you were together, as they asked separately for the blade-master or the people from Two Rivers. The rumors must be flying like the wind if they beat you here," Master Gill said with a smile. He leaned up to Rand, across the bar. "Do those two always fight?"
Rand just nodded with a grin. It was starting to be a common question. "Is Loial still here?" he asked.
Master Gill just nodded towards the library.
"Say! Master Gill, is it all right if we grab a snack before dinner?" Ranma asked. At his nod, he trotted towards the kitchen. Ranma bounded into the room with a smile that dropped very rapidly. "Er, hello Moiraine Sedai."
Moiraine just gave him a slightly flat look. She turned to Gilda who suddenly turned white. "Thank you for the food. Lan, would you take our saddlebags up to our rooms?" Egwene and Nynaeve pushed past him to find Rand and Mat with a small wave. She turned back to Ranma. "Good afternoon, Ranma. How are you, Rand, Mat and Akane?"
"Uh, we're fine. Well, I think Mat's a bit sick. Rand mentioned something about a dagger, but I didn't get how it could make him sick." Ranma scratched his head in consternation.
"Dagger?" Moiraine said sharply.
"Uh, I think Rand said he found it somewhere."
An expression of muted fear drifted across Moiraine's face. "They would not have. I must go see him. Now. You will have to guard the door."
"Uh, sure." In moments they moved upstairs, in the boy's room.
Moiraine took one look at Mat and suddenly strove over to him. "Stay away from him," she said. "And be quiet."
Mat stared back as intently as she. He bared his teeth in a silent, snarling rictus, and pulled himself into an ever tighter knot, but he never took his eyes from hers. Slowly she put one hand on him, lightly, on a knee drawn up to his chest. A convulsion shook him at her touch, a shudder of revulsion spasming through his entire body, and abruptly he pulled one hand out, slashing at her face with the ruby-hilted dagger.
One minute Ranma was behind her, the next he was at the bedside, as if he had not bothered with the intervening space. His hand caught Mat's wrist, stopping the slash as if it had struck stone. Moiraine suddenly commanded, "Don't touch the dagger, just hold him." Still Mat held himself in that tight ball. Only the hand with the dagger tried to move, straining against the martial artist's implacable grip. Mat's eyes never left Moiraine, and they burned with hate.
Moiraine also did not move. She did not flinch from the blade only inches from her face, as she had not when he first struck. "How did he come by this?" she asked in a steel voice. "I asked if Mordeth had given you anything. I asked, and I warned you, and you said he had not."
"Uh, I really don't know what you are talking about," Ranma said nervously.
Moiraine studied Mat. He still lay with his knees pulled up to his chest, still snarled soundlessly at her, and his hand yet fought Ranma to reach her with the dagger. "It is a wonder you got this far, carrying this. I felt the evil of it when I laid eyes on him, the touch of Mashadar, but a Fade could sense it for miles. Even though he would not know exactly where, he would know it was near, and Mashadar would draw his spirit while his bones remembered that this same evil swallowed an army; Dreadlords, Fades, Trollocs, and all. Some Darkfriends could probably feel it, too. Those who have truly given away their souls. There could not help but be those who would wonder at suddenly feeling this, as if the very air around them itched. They would be compelled to seek it. It should have drawn them to it as a magnet draws iron filings."
The rest of the Two Rivers folk were suddenly at the door, Lan just before them. He took a look at the deadly scene, but didn't move forward. "Moiraine?"
"I am safe for the moment. Ranma is more than strong enough to hold him," the Aes Sedai said.
"We are not safe here if the Dark One's minions can sense this," the Warder intoned. He was already planning for different contingencies.
"If we can find a way out of Caemlyn, the Halfmen will have no more interest here. If."
"Better we were all dead," Perrin said suddenly, and Rand jumped at the echo of his own thoughts. Perrin still sat staring at the floor-glaring at it now-and his voice was bitter. "Everywhere we go, we bring pain and suffering on our backs. It would be better for everyone if we were dead."
Nynaeve rounded on him, her face half fury and half worried fear, but Moiraine forestalled her.
"What do you think to gain, for yourself or anyone else, by dying?" the Aes Sedai asked. Her voice was level, yet sharp. "If the Lord of the Grave has gained as much freedom to touch the Pattern as I fear, he can reach you dead more easily than alive, now. Dead, you can help no one, not the people who have helped you, not your friends and family back in the Two Rivers. The Shadow is falling over the world, and none of you can stop it dead."
Perrin raised his head to look at her, and Rand gave a start. The irises of his friend's eyes were more yellow than brown. With his shaggy hair and the intensity of his gaze, there was something about him . . . Rand could not grasp it enough to make it out.
Perrin spoke with a soft flatness that gave his words more weight than if he had shouted. "We can't stop it alive, either, now can we?"
"I will have time to argue with you later," Moiraine said, "but your friend needs me now." She stepped aside so they could all see Mat clearly. His eyes still on her with a rage-filled stare; he had not moved or changed his position on the bed. Sweat stood out on his face, and his lips were bloodless in an unchanging snarl. All of his strength seemed to be pouring into the effort to reach Moiraine with the dagger Ranma held motionless. "Or had you forgotten?"
Perrin gave an embarrassed shrug and spread his hands wordlessly.
"What's wrong with him?" Egwene asked, and Nynaeve added, "Is it catching? I can still treat him. I don't seem to catch sick, no matter what it is."
"Oh, it is catching," Moiraine said, "and your . . . protection would not save you." She pointed to the ruby-hilted dagger, careful not to let her finger touch it. The blade trembled as Mat strained to reach her with it.
"This is from Shadar Logoth. There is not a pebble of that city that is not tainted and dangerous to bring outside the walls, and this is far more than a pebble. The evil that killed Shadar Logoth is in it, and in Mat, too, now. Suspicion and hatred so strong that even those closest are seen as enemies, rooted so deep in the bone that eventually the only thought left is to kill. By carrying the dagger beyond the walls of Shadar Logoth he freed it, this seed of it, from what bound it to that place. It will have waxed and waned in him, what he is in the heart of him fighting what the contagion of Mashadar sought to make him, but now the battle inside him is almost done, and he almost defeated. Soon, if it does not kill him first, he will spread that evil like a plague wherever he goes. Just as one scratch from that blade is enough to infect and destroy, so, soon, a few minutes with Mat will be just as deadly."
Nynaeve's face had gone white. "Can you do anything?" she whispered.
"I hope so." Moiraine sighed. "For the sake of the world, I hope I am not too late." Her hand delved into the pouch at her belt and came out with the silk-shrouded angreal. "Leave me. Stay together, and find somewhere you will not be seen, but leave me. I will do what I can for him."
They had gathered in the library after Mat had been cured. Ranma was a bit queasy, but he hadn't been allowed to leave, as he was holding the dagger back. Akane looked over at him, noting his very low demeanor. She gave him a worried glance, but Ranma only responded with quick smile.
Ranma ignored much of the conversation, even as it meandered from fleeing Caemlyn, Andor itself and to Tar Valon. He was confused about some points, but he really didn't feel like intruding.
"And he mentioned names in our dreams," Rand said carefully after looking at Mat and Perrin.
"I just beat him up," Ranma muttered while in deep thought.
Moiraine opened her mouth and then stopped in surprise at Ranma's comment. She gave him an appraising look. "You had this dream too?"
"Hm? Yeah, I guess." Ranma blinked as he was dragged into the conversation. "That's kind of freaky," he said after a moment.
"Shared dreams?" Akane asked.
"There has not been a dream walker in Tar Valon in over a thousand years," the Aes Sedai said in deep thought.
"He mentioned Logain," Rand said hollowly. "He said that the White Tower used False Dragons for their own ends."
Perrin laughed with a voice tinged in madness. "But he's not looking for a False Dragon, is he?" He looked over at Moiraine accusingly.