DISCLAIMER: I own neither Buffy the Vampire Slayer nor the Wheel of Time; they are the property of their respective authors, publishers, and probably a half-dozen other entities woven together in a more complicated weave than the Age Lace. If I could figure that out, I'd be a good IP lawyer. If I were the author, I'd be making you pay to read this. Unfortunately, looking around my rather Spartan apartment, I think it's safe to say that I'm neither, or there would be a Bang & Olufson home theater system in my living room. Don't sic the Trollocs on me.

SPOILERS/BACKGROUND: All Buffy the Vampire Slayer and Angel through Season 4 (no secondary sources, however); all main books of the Wheel of Time through Knife of Dreams. Of course, the WoT-verse is sufficiently complex that I'd be hard pressed to get everything right.

CHAPTER 2:

THE WISE ONES

Willow awoke groggily. Her head pounded as though a blacksmith had run out of anvils and had decided that her skull would do nicely, but she was alive. The feel of rope against her skin brought her awareness crashing back with painful alacrity, however. Dear Goddess, I'm naked! She was lying on her side in a tent, facing the wall, atop a thin mattress, little more than a comforter. Stout brown cords of some material that was almost cotton and yet not quite circled her wrists, ankles, lower thighs, and torso just above and below her bosom. The cords were much too tight to yield any wiggle room, though they did not cut off her circulation. Aside from the cords themselves, she had not a stitch on.

She rolled over onto her other side, and found Buffy and Faith in the same predicament, only they had been gagged as well. From the look of things, small pieces of cloth had been stuffed into their mouths, and then larger bands of material wrapped around their mouths twice and knotted off behind their heads. They were wide awake and glaring at her, though there was as much concern as anger in their gazes. If they had suffered any bruises, none were showing. She guessed that they had never been unconscious; had they been unconscious, their captors would never have gagged them if they wanted to keep them alive. And apparently, so far, their captors did in fact want them alive.

There were two others in the tent, both women, which was a small blessing. Both were staring at her intently, but at least there weren't any men. The first was only an inch or two taller than Faith, perhaps in her middle years, with hair that reminded her vaguely of Vi's, only longer. The other was several inches taller, and one could still tell that her hair had once been summery gold, though it was now nearly completely white. Both had emerald green eyes, near twins of Buffy's. There was nothing leering or gloating in the women's expressions. She might as well have been fully clothed for all the women seemed to take note of it. She opened her mouth to speak, then thought better of it. This was their tent, their world, their rules. Anything she said could turn out to be a mistake, perhaps a fatal one. If they wanted her to talk, they would tell her what they wanted her to say.

"Daeric was right," the older woman observed. "This one is no Aes Sedai. She's been awake for ten full seconds and has not demanded to be released yet." The faintest hint of a smile touched the corners of the other woman's mouth, but she gave no other response. Willow didn't even think that was an insult, at least not one directed at her; whatever scorn the woman felt was for these Aes Sedai, whoever they were, not for Willow herself.

The younger woman clapped her hands sharply, twice. The fold of the tent parted, and a man dressed completely in white walked in out of the night. Willow gave a frightened squeak and curled up in a ball as best she could with her arms bound behind her, rolling to face the tent wall again, trying to hide her most intimate areas from view. The older woman chuckled wryly, once. "Perhaps she is not so different from the wetlander women in all things, it seems," she noted. "Handuin, water for the lady. She may have it as soon as she tells us her name."

Willow cried softly. "Does he have to be here?" she whispered.

"Handuin is gai'shain," said the younger woman, though calling her that was perhaps a misstatement, as she was younger only by contrast to the taller, grandmotherly one. She might still have been twice Willow's age. "He will not harm you. Gai'shain are forbidden weapons, and no Aiel, gai'shain or not, will force himself upon you, but gai'shain least of all." She seemed almost irritated that she had to explain that, though her patience was holding for the moment.

"Willow," Willow said, after a deep breath that was more of a gulp. "My name is Willow Rosenberg."

"Of California, Daeric tells me."

Willow rolled over again to look the older woman in the eye. "Have you heard of it?" she asked, hopefully.

The older woman smiled wanly and shook her head. Willow wondered if the other woman had let that familiar note into her voice deliberately, just to test her reaction. If so, she wondered what she might have just told the woman. Something about the other woman's eyes told her that she didn't miss much. A moment later, however, the man, Handuin, entered the tent again. Willow forced her nerves to settle, despite the fact that a red flush was covering every inch of her that she could see. The younger woman appeared to have been telling the truth, however, as the gai'shain appeared to pay less attention to her naked than most boys at the Bronze had when she was fully clothed, which was to say, essentially none. He carried a pitcher of water and a set of small tin cups. He filled one and held it to her lips.

"Don't waste the water," the older woman said, matter-of-factly. "It is precious in the Three-fold Land. Those who waste it casually are punished."

Regaining a little of her courage, Willow mouthed quickly, "Wait." She leveraged herself into a sitting position. Trying to drink while lying on her side was just asking for trouble, if these people were as harsh on those who wasted water here as they claimed, and from what she had seen of the land for miles in all directions, she had little reason to doubt them. Conserving water in the desert, at least, was something she could understand. The gai'shain even betrayed a hint of a smile before he held the cup to her lips again. She drank as quickly as she dared; her mouth was truly parched, but she was careful not to let so much as a drop dribble down her chin. She only wished that the cup had been larger. This might be the middle of the desert, but there was a lake nearby, after all.

"You learn quickly," the older woman noted, with a slight hint of approval.

Willow held her silence, meeting the other woman's gaze. There was another long silence, and then the younger woman's face broke out in another smile, slightly warmer than any she had yet seen. "An interesting land, this California must be," she said, half to herself. The edges of the older woman's lips twitched, too, and she sat down in front of Willow.

"Let us see, then, dear, where to begin? I suppose I should start with my own name. I am Alsera, of the Salt Flat sept of the Nakai Aiel. I speak first for the Wise Ones in Rhuidean. My overexcited companion is Nandrys, of the Two Spires sept of the Reyn Aiel. You have already met her husband, Daeric, I believe. Appropriate, that she be the one to tend your injury." Willow's eyebrows raised at that. This was his wife? And she had tended the bump on her head? Well, whatever the woman had done, it had worked, so she wasn't about to complain; her head felt almost as good as new, though she still felt tired and drained.

"I expect that you will answer my questions truthfully. If you do, I may answer some of yours. If not ..." she let that sentence trail off into the air. There was no overt threat in it, but Willow got the point.

"I understand," she breathed.

"Good. Now, Daeric tells me that you three are all that came through the Portal Stone. Is this true?"

Willow nodded. Alsera held her eyes a moment, then continued.

"You know a weave to hide a person from view, am I right? It was you who wove the flows around yourself and your friends?"

"A ... weave? It's called the Cloak of Shadows, and it's an illusion spell. I've never heard it called a weave before. Though I guess it could be called that."

Willow wondered if she had said something wrong. Alsera's eyes narrowed, and she shared a long look with Nandrys, who gave the faintest hint of a shrug. "California," she murmured. Willow could make nothing of the tone of her voice.

"You claim you have no knowledge of the Portal Stone, yet you used it to come here. How is this possible?"

"It wasn't me," Willow said quickly, and she proceeded to tell what she could about the fight in the catacombs beneath Sunnydale, about finding the Portal Stone, about Buffy's sister activating it somehow, about the mist and the arrival in this Three-fold Land of theirs.

"These ... Turok-han," Nandrys said. "They are Shadowspawn of some kind?"

"I don't know that word," Willow replied. "But it sounds like it. They're powerful demons, creatures created of darkness, taking the lifeforce of humans and twisting it into something evil. There shouldn't have been so many in our world, however, so we thought they must have come in through this Portal Stone, so we wanted to find some way to shut it down. Destroy it, or seal off whatever world they came from so they couldn't come back to California."

"Dangerous," Nandrys noted.

"Not nearly as much as facing another army of these things. Once was enough. Too many innocent people were killed as it was."

"What do you think your friends are doing now?"

Willow was taken aback by that question. She hadn't even thought of that. "I ... I don't know. I don't think Giles—the, um, scholar that I mentioned—I don't think he could figure the Portal Stone out on his own. And they have other things they need to do, things that have to get done or ... anyway, they're probably heading to Los Angeles—that's the, um, greatest city in California—to get help. We have some friends there that might be able to do something. Maybe. This is way beyond anything any of us have ever seen before."

"Your friends would abandon you so quickly?" Alsera challenged.

Willow's eyes flashed, and she forgot her nudity for an instant. "They can't do anything for us just sitting there in the middle of the desert. They'll be back if they can. If they can't, well, that's war. And they know we can take care of ourselves."

Alsera chuckled. "So I've seen. Very well, I think I might answer a few of your questions now."

"Can I have some clothes?"

Alsera threw back her head and laughed. "I may provide you with information," she clarified. "Clothes will come later, if you earn them."

Willow grimaced. Well, it had been worth a try. She took another few breaths to steady herself. She imagined that she might not get a chance to ask more than a few questions from among the hundreds buzzing in her head. Concentrate, Willow. Focus on what's important. What's important. "Do any of you Wise Ones know how to work the Portal Stone? Or know anyone who can?"

Alsera and Nandrys looked at each other. "The Car'a'carn used the Portal Stone once," Alsera said at last. "But only to move his party from Tear to Chaendaer, where you arrived. I know no one who has been able to use it to move between worlds, though legend makes it capable of such wonders."

Willow took another breath. "All right. Who is this Car'a'carn? Can I meet with him?"

Alsera gave a mirthless chuckle. "The Car'a'carn hides even from us now, from his own people," she said grimly. "He has abandoned trust completely. Even the other dreamwalkers know nothing of his whereabouts. He vanished from the palace in Caemlyn, in the wetlands of Andor, the last we heard. As to what he is ... he is the prophesied one, the Chief of Chiefs, the Light help us all." She shook her head sadly.

"Where is Caemlyn?" Willow pressed on, undeterred.

Alsera smiled grimly. "Far to the west, all the way across the Three-fold Land and farther. Much more than a month's journey on horse."

Willow was about to burst out, I can move quickly when I have to, but thought better of it, lapsing into silence again instead. She could think of a hundred more questions, but was having trouble thinking of any that demanded more immediate answers than any others. Suddenly, the looks that Buffy and Faith were giving her registered in her mind, however. Nandrys and particularly Alsera had such commanding presences that they had consumed her attention until then. "Oh ... um ... I know you said you weren't looking for requests, just questions, but ... um ... is there anything I could do to get you to un-gag my friends?"

A rich laugh shook Nandrys' chest. "A selfless wish, to lessen the punishment of another, but nothing would ever be learned by any who escaped punishment through the sacrifice of others. A while longer of silence might be good for their tongues, and will at least be good for our ears."

Buffy and Faith both made furious noises behind the cloths over their mouths, and Willow winced. Buffy had a bit of a temper, and asking Faith to keep her language civilized was hard enough even if all she was doing was ordering a pizza. Her eyes sparked, and she faced both of them levelly. "Calm down, both of you," she said crisply. "These women aren't going to kill us, and they healed me. I'm all right. Really." Buffy and Faith both continued to stare daggers over the top of their gags, but they fell silent.

"Impressive," Alsera noted.

"They were worried about me," Willow replied.

"It is possible to worry with dignity," Alsera replied. Buffy and Faith shot the woman a vengeful look, but if she saw it, she gave no sign.

Willow shook her head. They were definitely a strange people. "All right, last question," she said. "What are you going to do with us?"

Alsera grinned. "I was wondering when you were going to ask that. Unfortunately, that I cannot answer yet. Normally, those crossing the Three-fold Land without permission are run naked back to the Dragonwall, but of course, that would make no sense in your case, since you don't come to us from any of the wetlands. We would send you home if we could, but that may well lie beyond our craft."

Willow cast her eyes down. Stuck here. The thought was not pleasant. And the only person in the entire world who had ever used one of these Portal Stones for anything had been hundreds of miles away, could be anywhere by now, and had never actually used it to travel between worlds, so far as Alsera knew, and Willow did not believe the woman was lying to her.

There was another minute of silence, then another woman entered the tent, clad in a loose brown dress and shawl like the other two Wise Ones, carrying a small satchel. This woman was of a height between Alsera and Nandrys, and was closer to Nandrys' age, with red-gold hair and a thick golden bracelet inlaid with glittering red crystals. She introduced herself as Dainya, of the Cossaida Chareen Aiel, then turned to Alsera and Nandrys. "How has she been?" she asked.

"Surprising, in more ways than one," Nandrys added. "She never even tested the shield."

Willow was confused. Shield? She looked around. There was nothing resembling a shield in sight.

"Interesting," Dainya said, setting down her satchel. "She has been answering, then?"

"Willow Rosenberg has been giving answers," Alsera said cautiously. Willow was not so foolish as to miss the difference between answering and giving answers. They still didn't believe her. But they were still talking to her.

"Perhaps she might give a few more, then," Dainya continued.

"I will leave you to it, then," Nandrys said, and without another word, turned and left. Dainya took Nandrys' place beside Alsera. Rotating sentry duty, Willow surmised. At least they had only assigned women to guard them, and apparently only these Wise Ones, not the veiled fighters they had faced on the mountain above. But what was this shield they were talking about? She wasn't going to try to do anything to anger them, but that would be hard if she couldn't even see what she was not supposed to break.

"What did you find, Dainya?" Alsera asked as the other woman left the tent.

"If they are ter'angreal, they are unlike any I've ever seen," the younger woman replied. "And what the papers mean, I cannot say." She reached in to the satchel and withdrew Buffy's wallet, which she must have had in a pocket of her clothing. Her own personal effects had been in her purse, which she had left on the school bus, worlds away now. Apparently Faith had not carried anything of note on her person, either; considering the tight clothing the raven-haired Slayer typically wore, that was hardly surprising. Dainya approached and laid the contents of the wallet on the ground in front of Willow. "Explain to me what I am seeing here."

Oh boy, Willow groaned. This was not going to be easy, and not because she saw any harm in giving true answers or didn't want to give them, but because she had no idea how to explain these kinds of things to people who had never heard of them. "Wow—this could take a while," she began. "Um—just stop me if I completely lose you. Those green pieces of paper are what we use for money ..."

"You use green pieces of paper for money? Of what worth are these? Is gold so rare in California?"

Willow really didn't want to get into an economics lesson, though she had aced the subject. She had aced all of her subjects. This wasn't the time or place for that kind of thing, however. "If people are willing to accept it as money, isn't it money? With that amount, I could buy ..." she grimaced. "... well, not much." Buffy gave her an withering look, but an equally resigned one. Willow was telling the unvarnished truth. Slaying was not the most lucrative trade on the face of the earth, and they had fled Sunnydale without so much as a trip to the ATM. Others had gotten there first, anyway, she was sure; there had been pandemonium in the last couple of days before the collapse.

Alsera bent to examine one of the bills. "This United States ... you mentioned it before. Your nation?" Willow nodded. "And does this nation have so little gold that you substitute paper for it? Or is paper so valuable there?"

Willow blew on one of her bangs. Her first instinct again was to launch into an economic history lecture, beginning with the development of paper money and proceeding all the way to the abandonment of the gold standard, but that was probably not what these people were looking for. But what were they looking for? "The United States is not poor, if that's what you mean," she said. "But we use these—well, basically because gold is kind of heavy if you carry around a lot of it. At least that was how it started. Though gold was worth more than five hundred dollars an ounce, the last time I checked, so that's kind of broken down. But people would still rather carry around cash—money like this—than gold, because it's easier to separate. I can give someone five dollars more easily than a hundredth of an ounce of gold."

Dainya waved her hand impatiently, signaling that she'd heard enough. "And this?"

"That's a credit card. Another thing we use like money. It ... well, the principle is that it's good for a loan of up to a certain amount. A lot of our people get in trouble with them," she added, for no particular reason. "That next card is a driver's license. It—wow—it means that Buffy's allowed to drive a car. A—a carriage that can move by itself, it's how most of us get around."

Dainya looked back at Alsera quizzically. Alsera shrugged. "Such things were rumored possible in the Age of Legends," she observed neutrally, "more than three thousand years ago."

There was a long silence. Then, at length, Alsera straightened and spoke. "Perhaps we could find some clothes for the woman." She clapped her hands three times in quick succession.

Willow's eyes went wide. "Can I—can I have my own clothes back?"

Alsera grinned wickedly. "Take another look at your friends." Willow did, and her eyes widened further. She had not taken a good look at the actual fabric that had been used to gag her friends. That was one of my favorite shirts, she sighed. There was no help for it now, however. She groaned and shook her head helplessly. She ventured a moment later, however, "and my friends? Can they have their clothes back?"

Alsera chuckled mirthlessly. "Ah, yes, one final question. I almost forgot." Her tone made it clear that she had actually done no such thing. "How is it that your friends are impervious to the Power?"

Willow leveled a questioning look at the older woman, then over to Buffy and Faith, both of whom wore expressions as puzzled as Willow's own. "What power?" she asked.

Suddenly, Willow felt something invisible wrap around torso and drag her to her feet, where she would have fallen had the band of unseen, solid air not held her upright. Her eyes went wide. So this was why the Wise Ones were their only guards! She should have guessed when the Aiel on the mountain had said that the Wise Ones might know how to work the Portal Stones! Her mind had simply never made the connection. And what they had just done there—if Willow hadn't known better, she would have sworn that a faint aura of light had appeared around the older woman just before the air tightened around her, like something just seen out of the corner of the eye. She saw Buffy and Faith both struggling furiously in their bonds now.

Alsera's eyes were ice again. "Do not," she snapped. Her voice had lost even the hints of compassion of moments earlier, and Willow would have backed away a step had she been able. "Do not play coy with me. You know of the Power. You admitted as much."

"I did?"

"Your Cloak of Shadows."

Willow's mind raced. She had no idea what they were talking about with this Power, but apparently it was whatever was the source of magic in this world, at least as far as these Wise Ones knew. They thought she was using the Power when she wove the Cloak of Shadows. And that Buffy and Faith were immune to it! But nothing of the kind had ever been the case on Earth—Buffy and Faith had both been hit by spells before. She winced. She had hit Buffy with more than a few spells of her own during her brief stint on the dark side.

"I—I don't know," she said at last. "I don't think the power I use is the Power you do."

Suddenly, with a soft but sharp ripping sound, the bonds holding Buffy gave way, fibers tearing lengthwise as though snapped taut beyond their endurance by a great weight dropped from the top of a building. With a muffled snarl, muffled because she did not dare even take a moment to remove the gag, the summer-haired Slayer launched herself at the Wise Ones.

Only the fact that Buffy was still a little tangled in the ropes, and perhaps was a little stiff from so long confined, gave Willow the slightest chance to react. "Enstricta!" she chanted, and Buffy's figure went stiff. The Wise Ones suddenly swung back to face her. Alsera's eyes were still icy, but there was a faint hint of wonder there as well. Dainya's control over her features slipped even more; the copper-haired woman's expression slipped for a moment into complete astonishment before she regained her composure. Willow filed that away to ponder later, but otherwise ignored them for the moment. "Buffy, no, I'm fine, really, I'm fine, they didn't hurt me, I promise." She would have held out a placating hand, but her arms were still cinched behind her back.

The tent flaps parted, and two more Wise Ones strode in, Nandrys and another, a pale-skinned woman nearly as tall as Alsera, with bleached blond hair so light it might as well have been white, though she was younger than even Dainya by at least a decade. They both wore wary expressions, and again Willow had the sense of both of them surrounded by auras, there, at the edge of sight, but unmistakable now that she understood where and how to look for it. Even without that, however, their eyes would have told Willow that they were ready to strike, and strike hard. Willow let her awareness spread outward, already nearly certain of what she would find. A ring of people around the tent, all with the taut wariness of warriors on the edge of battle. It was reminiscent of the sense she had gotten from the band of Slayers before they had descended into the catacombs beneath the Seal of Danthalzar.

"Please, Alsera," she said. "Buffy was only trying to protect me."

Alsera hesitated, the first time Willow had seen her do that, looking from Willow to Buffy and back again. Abruptly, she made a decision. "I believe I requested clothes for young Willow Rosenberg here," she said, to no one in particular. She turned to Willow. "If you believe your friend has quelled her—anger—you may release her. Be warned. If you're wrong, it will go badly for all of you."

Willow did not hesitate before releasing Buffy from the cords of power she had wrapped her in. Bad enough that these people had tied Buffy up, now Willow had done it, too. It had to be done, though. They would never have left here alive if Buffy had reached the Wise One. Willow was certain of that. "Keep a grip," she said firmly.

"Leave it," Alsera commanded, noticing Buffy reaching up to remove her gag.

"Do as she says," Willow added, seeing Buffy hesitate. "Buffy, the tent's surrounded. Don't get us killed." Buffy glowered at her, but let her hand fall.

Unreadable glances passed between the four Wise Ones, before the youngest, who had not given her name, turned and strode from the tent. Alsera turned back to Willow. "I think it might be best if we separate you. Your companions seem to fear your well-being more than their own."

Willow shrugged. "It's their way." Buffy drew another sharp breath through her nose, and Willow cast a pleading look at her. Please, please, don't do anything stupid.

Alsera strode over to Buffy, until her face was only a foot from the Slayer's, as if daring her to attack. "If you attempt to leave this tent, for any reason, your friend will not live out the night. Nod if you understand." Despite being naked as the day she was born, save for the strips of cloth wedged in her mouth and tied between her teeth, Buffy met the woman's gaze levelly. She did nod, however. Alsera repeated the warning to Faith, who nodded as well. She then turned to face Willow again. That half-seen aura of light whirled around her once more, and then a shadow of pitch blackness descended over Willow's eyes, effectively blindfolding her. A moment later, however, she felt something pass through the cords, which fell away from her and into a heap at her feet. A moment later, she felt a soft woolen robe being draped around her shoulders. "Let her friends speak when we are gone," she said calmly. "I do not believe they will try to escape." With that, she put a hand on Willow's arm, gently but firmly, and guided her from the tent.

"Oh, stop pacing, B, if they wanted us dead, we'd be dead," Faith murmured, sprawled out facedown on one of the two thin mattresses in the tent. Buffy noted that the raven-haired Slayer was a lot more comfortable in her skin than Buffy herself was, though that was hardly a surprise. The Aiel had freed Faith from her bonds and removed the gags from both of them, but they had not given them any clothes, and she knew that they weren't going to be getting their own clothes back. Unlike Willow, she had been awake when their Earth clothes had been cut away from them.

"It's not that I'm worried about," Buffy replied. Curse them, but they had found the one thing that would keep her in place here ropes never could. She was sealed in the tent as effectively as if in a mountainside. More.

Faith turned to look up at her, raising herself on one elbow. "I worry about her, too, B," she said, comfortingly, which was as much a shock as anything that had happened today, "but I don't think they're going to kill her. I actually think they believed her."

"Really? Why's that?"

"I think if they didn't, we'd all be dead," Faith replied simply, and laid herself down on the mattress again. "Now if you don't mind, I want to get some sleep. You want to kill something, kill the light. I took down thirty-six Turok-han today. Good day's work."

Buffy shook her head helplessly, but then again, if nothing else, darkness would help hide her nudity. Gritting her teeth, she extinguished the three-wicked candle that provided the only light in the tent. She could still see the red glow of a campfire burning outside the tent flap, but the flap was closed. Wearily, she lay down on the mattress. She was tired. More than tired. She had been awake for more than twenty hours, through two hard battles, and a long march in the desert sun with her arms bound behind her back.

She rolled over to look at Faith in the darkness. Perhaps it wasn't completely dark, since she could see the outlines of the younger Slayer on the nearby pallet. "You didn't take down thirty-six Turok-han, did you?"

She heard Faith stifle a soft laugh. "You were down on the ground with a sword in you for a couple minutes. Spent too much time talking with Spike, too." Buffy shook her head. Was she that transparent?

"I still got thirty-two in short minutes," she grinned. The darkness definitely made coping with her nakedness easier.

"Remember, back by the bus, I said I wanted to sleep for a week?" Faith said, forcing the words through an unmistakable yawn. "I think I'm starting now. Wake me next Tuesday."

Buffy wanted to reply, but the moment she allowed her head to relax back against the coarse pillow, really just a pile of rags, sleep washed over her in a rolling tide.

Standing near the back wall of the tent, Nandrys straightened. She turned to the woman in white beside her, made a quick motion with her hand, and watched the gai'shain trot off in the direction of Alsera's tent. Nandrys waited only a moment longer, confirming again to herself that the pair in the tent truly were asleep, before starting off for her own. They had spoken of two battles in a single day, and they did have the bone-weary look of fighters who had endured a full day of war, though the forced march down from Chaendaer could have accounted for as much of that. Certainly, if what Daeric had told her was true, it was not fighting him that worn them down so much; they had bested seven algai'd'siswai like two rock-foxes loosed into a flock of chickens. Perhaps they spoke the truth. Their story was almost too incredible to be a lie, and the three of them seemed to great a mystery for this world to hold. The strange artifacts in the blond woman's wallet. The fact that the redhaired woman could apparently channel without seeming to embrace the Source, and could do so while shielded. The fact that the Wise Ones' flows passed through the two warrior women as though they were no more than phantoms in the air, yet the red-haired woman's power could clearly touch them. Had Willow Rosenberg not restrained her friend, the three strangers might have died, but she was sure Alsera would have been dead where she stood, and perhaps herself and Dainya and Charyn as well. Dainya had confided that she had nearly swallowed her tongue when the blond woman, Buffy, tore free of those cords; she had been bound tightly enough to hold a packhorse, and she had not just wriggled free, she had torn the ropes like flimsy unspun wool.

Perhaps they spoke the truth. Perhaps not. Perhaps they slept too deeply tonight to be touched by dreams, but if they did not, then the truth would come out tonight. Of that she was certain. At least, she admitted to herself, she wished that she could be.

AUTHOR'S NOTES: Thanks for all the interest! I was honestly and pleasantly surprised to see that many WoT readers out there (as well as a few who were willing to give a new tale of mine a try even without being familiar with the WoT-verse ... quite the compliment, that).

ellf ... I certainly hope I can finish this. The WoT-verse is so complex that it's almost impossible to do a short crossover fic and do Jordan's world justice (or at least make a valiant attempt at it ... could never measure up to the real thing), so this one should keep me occupied for a long while.

Baalsfire ... the ji'e'toh rules only really apply among Aiel, though some Aiel themselves are headstrong enough to hold them to it. Nevertheless, the Shaido notwithstanding, Aiel don't make non-Aiel gai'shain and don't make themselves gai'shain to non-Aiel.

Velara ... thanks for that. The Portal Stones screamed "crossover!" to me the first time I read the WoT series, so that was a plot device I'd been waiting to bring out for a long time.

Colpinky, Jen, Ariskari ... I'll do my best.

PhoebeOtaku ... my apologies for your intersecting irises! Here's hoping for another "unlikely" success!

COMING SOON: Chapter 3, "What Can Be Learned in Dreams." Slayers have powerful dreams (even if this power was never very often brought out in the Buffy canon). The WoT-verse has Tel'aran'rhiod, the World of Dreams, with all kinds of useful, potent, and deadly quirks of its own. The Aiel have dreamwalkers.

Wackiness ensues.