Chapter 21
In Need of a Hero
The Seanchan didn't take my advice, of course. As I approached, they formed up in the street again, the formation bristling with spears. It wouldn't be enough to stop me, but I'd pay for it if I tried to bull through.
But I was a dragon. I didn't need to lower myself to something as primitive as tearing them apart with teeth and claws. My head reared back as I stopped and took a deep breath.
Burn!
I exhaled a stream of liquid fire that I shaped to flow through the street and avoid the buildings on either side. I didn't want to set the city aflame. Just the Seanchan. Even then, its passage singed shutters and doors.
The soldiers had no chance to dodge. The ones at the edges of the formation screamed as their clothes and hair caught fire, they danced and rolled over the ground trying to put it out. In the center of the formation, only ash remained.
The lance continued on a good 30 meters beyond the soldiers before petering out, the last few flames rolling up into the sky. Behind me, the sounds of battle increased. A glance told me the golems were getting the better of the soldiers. They hadn't managed to form up again, and as individuals, they just couldn't do much against an opponent made of fired clay rather than flesh.
The ground erupted under my feet and I nearly lost my balance as cobblestones hit my thigh and belly. It stung, but not much more than that. I looked around and caught sight of the sul'dam, peeking out from an alley near the harbor itself.
I could deal with her now, but not without spending Effort if I wanted to spare the damane. And I did, because having her die so close to freedom was a waste. But I wasn't here to rampage through the Seanchan army. I just had to make it look like I was.
A flick of my claw sent a bolt of lightning down the street. The sul'dam threw herself into cover and so missed that the bolt grounded itself after only 15 meters. But it bought me time to run down the street, past the smoking remains of the Seanchan cohort, and into the side street to my right.
The houses here were tall, so I could hide if I ducked my head low enough. Still, they heard me coming. The Seanchan soldiers stood ready when I burst out onto the street behind them.
They still flinched when they saw me and I made good use of it. A leap with a little assist from my wings saw me land among them, scattering the soldiers as the impact of my landing made the buildings around me shake. A kick sent more sprawling, a swipe of my claw opened up a soldier's belly as it parted steel like paper.
Men and women shouted, an officer trying to restore some order but one step brought him in reach and I grabbed him. "What goes up," I said to his soldiers who reared back at the revelation I was no mere beast. Then I tossed the officer high into the sky. Nowhere near high enough to hit the couple of raken circling in the sky, but high enough I had the time to finish my sentence. "Must come down."
The officer hit the roof to my left, bounced off and landed to the left of the Seanchan soldiers opposing me. My left, their right, that is. More than a couple looked in his direction, but it was obvious he was dead.
I took a step forward and the soldiers retreated. But that wasn't good enough. They were still in good order, still holding together. I needed to crack that discipline of theirs.
A coughing bark made me look up just in time to see a bear-sized frog-looking thing with three armored eyes and a hooked beak for a mouth jump over the Seanchan soldiers. The monster slammed into my chest. I grunted at the impact, stepping back to catch my balance.
It was a grolm!
It bit down, its beak scraping against the scales of my shoulder while its own claws sought purchase. It drew no blood, but it crushed the muscles beneath my scales against my own collarbone.
Then a second beak clamped down on my left ankle. The bolt of pain made my leg wobble. My right knee hit the cobblestones and when I tried to catch myself my hand went through the wall of the house before I came to a stop.
A clear note suddenly rang through the streets of Falme, cutting through the sounds of battle. It wasn't loud, yet everyone heard it and even the grolm stilled at hearing it. It was hard to describe, like the sound of hope.
I could see the puzzlement on the faces of the Seanchan around me. But unlike them, I knew what that was. I laughed. "And that, ladies and gentlemen, is the sound of inevitability." My claws sunk into the grolm on my chest and I unleashed a bolt of lightning directly into it. "That is the sound of your death."
I didn't know why letting loose like this was making me quote movies. Maybe it was my desire to be dramatic right now. What better way than just stealing from the best? That made some sense to me, but not quite there.
The grolm gave a coughing snarl, but it still bucked and struggled in my grip. With a painfilled grunt, I tore the creature off me and threw it down the street. It bowled through the Seanchan soldiers that had just redressed their ranks before it came to a stop, but I could already see it scrambling back to its feet.
I peered down at the other grolm, still trying to gnaw my leg off; blood trickled down my ankle. I speared the claws of my left hand into the space just behind its triangular head, right where its spine was. The grolm coughed as its legs gave out and it let go of my leg. After a moment, however, its legs started to twitch and it still drew breath. I stabbed it again and again, but it wasn't dying. It occurred to me it wasn't trying to eat me either and my heart rate slowed.
Thinking on it, I remembered that the only grolm killed on page was by shooting one of their eyes. Lifting my left foot up, I stomped its head flat. Its legs kicked out once, then nothing. I couldn't hid a grimace at the feel of gristle underneath my foot or how it stuck to the cobblestones for a moment when I stepped away.
Fog had descended from nowhere and I could no longer see much further than about sixty meters. Though from somewhere in the north, I could hear fresh explosions signaling the fight had restarted. My distraction was no longer needed then, it was time to throw my real weight around.
Taking a deep breath, I belted out another stream of fire that engulfed the grolm as well as the remaining Seanchan. However tough a grolm was, it couldn't survive being cremated alive any better than any other living creature. Checking nobody else was around I resumed my human form. Some things were easier to do when you were smaller.
Though getting closer to the ground like this, I was assaulted by the smell of burned flesh, blood, and ash. I gagged at the smell. Breathing through my mouth only helped a little. I went around to clear a space and carved a simple circle of about three meters in diameter.
Then I stood in the middle and pulled out the celestial shard. Most of the more involved preparations had been done this past week. All that was left was pulling the trigger.
I took a deep breath, only to jump when men shouted as they stormed out of a side street not ten meters away. Three of them, each riding these strange lizardlike creatures as big as horses. The look in their three eyes was strangely intelligent. I'd noticed that same intelligence the first time I'd seen a torm prowl through the streets of Falme.
"Another one!" Only one Seanchan had been looking where they were going, the other two looked back, but at that shout they looked at what he was pointing at. Which would be me, standing among two dead grolm and a lot more dead soldiers.
They all spurred their torms on as they drew their swords, coming right for me.
I sprang forward, then leaped up in a somersault over the dead grolm. Picking it up as I spun through the air I launched it as my feet touched the ground again. The mounts actually looked surprised when the big corpse flew through the air. It collided with the middle torm with a bone-shattering crunch, burying the rider underneath.
I continued my charge, drawing the two halves of my weapon. Another jump, I sent a bolt of lightning at the rider to my left while I fell upon the other rider. Even so, he brought his sword up while leaning to the side. His blow deflected my pounce and I missed my landing, glancing off the flank of the torm I rolled along the cobblestones before springing back to my feet.
The lizard spun around, its tail lashing out at me. I blocked it with my club, a grunt escaping at the impact. We both charged the other this time. Only for torm and rider to burst into flames when a silver spear flashed past my shoulder and hit them.
I spun around just in time to block a spear thrust that sent sparks flying. One, two, a swipe that would have taken my head off and still bit into my shoulder even with much of its force spent. Only now did I have enough time to take in my new opponent. A woman on a horse, she held a spear in her right and a center-gripped shield with a white horse on it in the other. Fine mail covered her torso as well as the upper parts of her limbs, while a conical helmet with a nose guard protected her head.
She wasn't Seanchan and one look at the spear told me it was more than simply a weapon of steel and wood. I was fighting a hero of the Horn!
I jumped back and held up my weapons. "I'm a friend of Rand Al'Thor. We already rescued Egwene!"
The hero froze and halted her charge. "Indeed? You were not there when he called upon our aid."
"That's because he didn't know the rest of his friends were already in town, working on a rescue. But Egwene's safe."
She studied me for a moment, then nodded. "Then we must make sure she remains safe. The enemy has already rallied." She spurred her horse on, but I stepped into her way. Only to wince at the pain flaring from my shoulder. Could I go on one adventure without getting stabbed?
"Actually, I could use your help myself. Egwene's freed, but these Seanchan are keeping hundreds of others in bondage. I'm setting them free, but I can't if my working is interrupted. Could you guard my back as I do my thing?"
She raised an eyebrow, then examined the design I'd created before I was interrupted. "Very well, I shall keep the enemy off of you while you … do your thing."
"Great!" I hopped into the circle again; the pain wasn't so bad this time. I just had to tell myself that until I believed it. Then I spared a glance at the two figures battling in the sky. One wore dark robes and wielded an ebony staff, the other was dressed like a nobleman with reddish hair and a glowing sword. They weren't giants, yet even though they were high up in the sky battling on a cloud, they were perfectly visible.
It wasn't something of the One Power, I knew that. I considered what it could be as as I activated the circle, a silver light spun itself into the air around me. Maybe this was some effect of the Horn, or the Pattern wanted to broadcast their clash to set events in motion.
I took out the celestial shard and reached out to the circle with my power. And through it to the anchors I'd placed around the city. The working was ready, it hummed with restrained power and the shard between my palms buzzed in sympathy.
These chains were forged of fear!
But that didn't feel right. The Pattern was fate, destiny, it worked its way in happenstance and the weight of decisions made by millions. Not this. The Horn was possible, it had summoned the fog along with the heroes.
A group of Seanchan infantry came up the road at a quick pace. I could hear their armor clanking and then an officer shouting an order to attack. Then the screaming started as the hero of the Horn counter-charged.
I didn't look, though I kept my eye on the fight going on in the sky. I considered the possibility that this was something Ba'alzamon had arranged. Was he truly here in the flesh, or was this some sort of Dreaming technique? If Lan'fear and the others were out, it stood to reason Ishamael would be. But he couldn't use the One Power to fly any more than Rand could. Or maybe I was overthinking this.
"How long will this take?" the hero of the Horn asked as she had to give way to the Seanchan. Arrows shattered on her shield while her spear parried three with a single motion. But still the hero took a step back. It made no sense; they were only mortal. But this fight was tied to the one happening above.
"I'm waiting for the right moment." Won't be long now, I saw Rand halt Ba'alzamon's advance, but he was clearly struggling. "But I just realized I haven't introduced myself in all the commotion. I'm Ron Shen."
"Ah, I have had many names." Metal shattered. "But you will know me as Buad of Albhain."
"Nice to meet you." The name sounded familiar. But from where? She wasn't one of the big heroes featured in the books, I was sure of that. The only female heroes that got more than a mention was Ameterasu and Birgitte. Or was it Amarasu?
A single soldier tried to flank Buad and hit the boundary of the circle. The discharge sent him flying and I almost lost my grip on the celestial shard. "Please keep them out of the circle."
"I am doing my best," the hero shouted. "But we are tied to the banner and the one that called us! As he struggles, so do we!"
"Don't worry, he's about to finish this," I said as I saw him assume a new guard. I wasn't much of a swordsman, even with my godly boost, but even I could tell he left himself wide open.
Ishamael hesitated for a moment, sensing the trap but not seeing it. And then he committed himself, the black staff piercing Rand in the stomach, and in doing so he had nothing to defend himself with when Rand struck. Hard to tell if he hit his opponent or the black mass behind the robed figure, but either way it was Ishamael that was flung away, and disappeared.
Rand vanished as well now, but I saw a small figure descending like a limp leaf. I didn't bother watching to see where he would land, because I felt it now. The world had been holding its breath, destiny had balanced on a knife edge. Now it was released, Rand was committed, and nobody was in a position to stop me as I pulled all that freed potential and unleashed the change.
These chains are quenched in anguish!
The shard between my hands lit up like a star before a pillar of light pierced the heavens. Other, smaller beams erupted from the elsewhere in the city and joined with the central pillar. My mind rode that beam to another place, one whose location I didn't know but it was what this room contained that was important.
These chains shall end a people!
I couldn't describe the entire Celestial Engine, the words to do so didn't exist in any language I knew. Here was a set of interlocking musical notes that spun around a set of equations described by knots of light and time. There was a crystal folded into itself. And there were a hundred more parts like it and a thousand that were nothing so simple.
So break this reign of terror!
But I didn't need to describe it to understand it. I simply knew what I wanted, and I knew how to accomplish that goal. A zero became a one, F# became F, and mint green turned to lawn green. Then I was back in the material world; the shard had turned to a handful of dust that simply slipped through my fingers and the world.
There was no shockwave or ripple, no visible sign of the change progressing through the world, but I felt it. It had already reached the walls on one end and the edge of the harbor on the other, showing no signs of stopping. In that harbor, one ship lost its masts as they toppled while an explosion ripped apart another.
"You have done it," Buad said. "I could feel it. I would ask you how you did it, but the battle and my time here are over." She nodded and turned her horse away.
Her name still bugged me; it sounded so familiar. No, the last part was familiar. "Albion." Another name for the British Isles. And there was a famous woman that led and perhaps fought in England.
"Buad," I called out after her, "were you once known as Boudicca, Queen of the Iceni?"
