Chapter CXXV - Sometimes Ancient Relics Should Stay Buried

Ebou Dar

Elayne pulled the door open as quietly as she could, rapidly spinning inverted webs around her and Mat to conceal their footsteps and blur their forms. She was about to step onto the stairs when Mat put his hand on her shoulder and shook his head, after a moment she nodded and he crept ahead, Ashandarei held out. It made sense for him to go first. She was no close combat fighter and, bluntly, he could recover from almost any injury while she could not.

There was a grim silence from downstairs. There had been several wise women down there along with a number of servants and guards. If only one of them had even had the chance to scream, then Elayne had to wonder what in the Light was down there. She winced as a stair creaked under her foot. It felt deafeningly loud in the silence. It was dark, too dark. Someone or something had put the torches out. Elayne hesitated, then spun a ball of light into the air, she had no desire to be stabbed in the dark be someone she could not see. She placed the light ahead and to the side of her though, no point in highlighting exactly where she was.

As soon as the harsh light illuminated the hall below she and Mat froze. There was a man standing there, revealed by her light. Bodies surrounded him, simply torn apart, horrified rictuses painted across faces that weren't always joined to the rest of the body.

He was slender with a non-descript face, sandy hair and a faint smile on his lips. Elayne realised with a jolt that he had been staring straight at her when he was first revealed, as if he had known exactly where she was. The incongruity of the scene was only worsened by the blood smeared all across the man's front.

Elayne did not hesitate. He might not look like much, but he had almost certainly killed a number of channelers without any trouble. Trying to capture him would be idiocy. She spun fire, air, water and spirit into a fast and, more importantly, lethal, web. At the same time Mat leapt forward with a shout bringing the Ashandarei down in a slash.

Before the first web was truly on its way Elayne was already spinning more, splitting her flows. She was taking no chances. Then she goggled as the first web simply faded when it touched the man.

He moved. Blindingly fast. Elayne had watched Aiel training, had seen Tel fighting with a sword. This man, if it was even a man, was faster. He seemed to simply flow around Mat's Ashandarei, sliding past him so quickly she could barely follow the movement. Every web simply faded as it touched him.

Mat stumbled away, clutching a stomach that was rapidly turning red where the man had slashed his hand across it. Elayne had no time to worry about her lover. If she survived she could help him.

She backpedaled up the stairs as the distance closed terrifyingly quickly. Taija had made her, Egwene and Nynaeve drill again and again for if they needed to kill Cadsuane. This was the same. Maybe worse? Cadsuane could not move like that, but it seemed this man could not channel.

Elayne ripped a section of bannister off the wall with the Power and sent it flying at the man like a spear, he side stepped it almost casually, only to be slammed back down the stairs by the slab of stone she had pulled out of the wall with another web.

Somehow he landed on his feet. She was sure she had hit him hard enough that he should have been badly injured, if not dead. The man's faint smile was gone, replaced with a scowl. He finally spoke, bending down briefly and then straightening up. "I will enjoy the taste of your blood." This was no man.

Elayne was not wasting her time, she had reached the top of the stairs and she was not going to leave Mat alone with the creature, so she could retreat no further. However, she could still channel. She frantically spun webs, splitting her flows. First a ward against sound around her and the creature, then she was ripping and tearing bits from the floor and walls behind it, just outside the ward, lining them up, ready to strike.

She was about to unleash everything on it when it moved first. With a blindingly fast motion its hand whipped out, sending a piece of something straight at her. Elayne barely moved her head fast enough, feeling a streak of pain as something cut straight across her cheek. Then the creature was sprinting towards her. Elayne instantly dismissed the pain, she had had worse.

Stone and wood flew at the man. He was fast, her webs were faster. Once again he was flung down the stairs. This time she did not give him time to recover. A length of wood slammed into him. She could have sharpened it. She had not. She wanted to pulverise him. It drove him to the ground, crushing his chest flat with inexorable force before splintering into him. Elayne did not let up. She might not be able to touch him with the Power, but as Taija had taught her, that was hardly a significant problem once one knew what was going on.

Its chest seemed to be flowing back into position where the wood had been, it was propping himself up on his elbows. Fine. She smashed it down again with stone, lifting the slab and propelling it back down again and again. The idiot creature thought this was a fight. Once she knew its little trick it was simply an execution. It might be able to heal like Mat could, that and unnatural strength. So what? Cadsuane was hard to injure too.

She probably could not batter it to death the way she would have Cadsuane, but there were other ways. Earth was her weakest element, but she had plenty of strength, especially with her angreal. Elayne was conscious that she would probably be making a beacon of herself to anyone in the Rahad, but she could worry about that later. She drew on her full strength, pulling stone and then earth from the floor, from the very foundations of the building. Hopefully it would hold together after this. All of it she wrapped into a sphere around the creature, using it to pull it off the ground and then surround it, forcing it into a tight ball. Her webs did not touch the creature, just the material around it. As the earth and stone closed around it, she could see it struggling with that immense strength. However, unnatural strength was nothing compared to saidar.

In seconds she had a tight, and more importantly solid, ball of earth formed around it. Held in the air in front of her with the Power. She could feel the pressure as it fought to break free, it was nothing. There were no gaps. Given the creature's ability to heal it was probably too much to hope for that it would suffocate, but so be it. She had other plans. If it could indeed survive without air it would have plenty of time to contemplate the folly of killing her people.

Elayne strode down the stairs, full of dignity now that her enemy was subdued. She ignored the blood trickling down her cheek. The first thing to do was to check on Mat. Judging by the sound of cursing he was alright, but it could not have been an enjoyable experience for him. By the time she reached him, Mat was already on his feet. His shirt was ruined, but beyond that he seemed uninjured, or at least healed, thank the Light.

He glanced at the occasionally shivering ball of stone and earth hovering beside her and then at her grim face. "Mother's milk in a cup Elayne, has anyone ever told you you're terrifying?!"

She gave him her best regal smile, "once or twice." Then the facade cracked. "Are you alright Mat? Did it hurt you?" She reached out to him.

Mat gave her hand a reassuring squeeze, "I'm fine. He's still alive in there? What are we going to do about him?" She could see in his eyes that he was upset, but he was strong, holding himself together. They could talk properly later.

"I have a plan," why did Mat look worried at that? "We will need some more of the Kin first though, I do not think I am strong enough to do it by myself. Ones we can trust. Reanne perhaps and three or four others. Can you find Reanne and get her to bring help? You can tell them I will be in the courtyard of the Six Sisters Street safehouse."

Mat nodded, picked up his Ashandarei and headed off into the dark. Elayne took a minute to carefully check the ground floor rooms for any survivors. Once she was certain there were none she too headed out into the dark streets of the Rahad, utterly confident that nobody would bother her.

It did not take Elayne long to reach the safehouse. She made her way through to the courtyard and waited, her sphere of compressed earth hanging beside her.

A few minutes later Mat came hurrying in, followed by Reanne and another three wise women. She came to a halt, chest heaving for breath and eyed up the sphere. "Is that…?"

Elayne nodded. "Yes, it is still very much alive in there. It was no man, just some kind of creature, shadowspawn I think. Any human would be dead after what I did to it, this… thing is too fast, too strong, heals any injury and dissolves any web that touches it."

"What are you going to do with it then? Fire?"

Elayne smiled in an unfriendly way. "Among other things. However, I do not think I am strong enough alone, lend me your strength?"

Reanne stared in surprise for a second, of course she would be used to Elayne far surpassing any of them in strength with her angreal. "Of course, anything you need."

Moments later they were all linked, their strength flowing through Elayne. She paused to think for a moment, this would be difficult given her relative weakness in earth, then she started to spin.

First she dug out the bottom of the courtyard, a mixture of air and earth pulling the ground open and excavating a deep hole. It took a few minutes, but once she was sure it was deep enough she lowered her sphere down into it.

"These will likely be the last words you hear creature. If you are lucky you will die, if you are unlucky, you will face silence for all eternity, but remember this. My name is Elayne Trakand and if you come after my people, I will make you suffer." As she spoke, Elayne twisted the webs holding the solid earth around the monster, tightening them, moulding them to its body. It was delicate work, holding the covering over it completely solid and yet close to its body. Yet, with the amount of the Power available to her, it was not too challenging.

Then Elayne started to fill in the hole with dirt. Shoveling it back in in voluminous quantities. In no time at all the earth-enclosed figure of the monster vanished under the mud and rock. Once the pit was almost but not quite full, Elayne drew fully on the circle, reaching out with the Power, a web of earth, fire and spirit extended down into the ground, solidifying it into a large box around the monster, the walls of a prison. They would not be unbreakable, but they would resist any simple attempts at digging. They would also resist heat, to a point. She mentally thanked Taija for insisting she learn some building techniques, despite her lack of talent with earth.

"You might want to stand back and cover your eyes."

Elayne spun fire and earth, but mostly fire. She pushed the web deep into the box she had created, spreading it through the churned soil. Then she fed the full strength of the circle into it.

At first there was no visible effect, but as Elayne poured in a huge volume of saidar, heat started to radiate off the patch of ground. Heat that rapidly rose in intensity until there was a faint red haze over it. Elayne kept on funneling more of the Power into her web, although even she had to take a step back.

After a few more seconds she heard a gasp behind her, "is the soil boiling?"

"Indeed, a few more seconds and everything around the creature will be liquid. I very much doubt it will survive." And if it did, well, it would be rather difficult for it to escape perfectly sealed solid rock.

Elayne held the web for a few more minutes, to make entirely sure and then released it, allowing the melting, burning soil inside the box she had created to start to cool. Of course she was not going to just leave it to cool naturally, who knew how long that would take. Once again spinning a web Taija had taught her to strengthen stone, she fed it into the still bubbling pool, pushing it deep into it. She could not feel where the creature was, but she could feel the web spreading through the molten soil around it. Wherever the web went, liquid turned to stone, far stronger than it would ever have been without her intervention. With the amount of saidar available to her it did not take long to solidify everything inside the walls she had created.

Then it was just a matter of covering it up. Elayne quickly channeled the remaining soil and stone back into place over what was now a large cube of power-solidified stone. Of course it still stood out, but that did not matter now. "Reanne, would you mind arranging for this to be repaired so that it looks like nothing ever happened?"

"Of course…" Reanne sounded stunned. Elayne on the other hand was just tired now and she really wanted to talk to Mat, to make sure he was not too distressed.

"Thank you, I think I shall retire for the night now. Come Mat, it has been a trying night for both of us."

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Maradon

Mashiara, no she would not call herself that, Lanfear took a sip of tea and smiled sweetly at the idiot woman in front of her. The so-called aes sedai had bumbled her way into Maradon and installed herself here, despite the frosty welcome from the local nobility. She was accompanied by some initiates from Taija's ridiculous attempt at recreating a dead instituion, which was a mild surprise. She had thought that the White Tower was at loggerheads with the Hall, but given everything she supposed it was inevitable they would work together. One undeniable weakness of the Shadow compared to the Light was its inability to work together efficiently. Trying to get the Chosen to support her own plans was an exercise in futility, the fools.

"I really am honoured to meet a true aes sedai," she simpered, disgusted at herself, but needs must. "I have always thought it would be so glorious to become aes sedai."

The fool woman smiled benevolently at her and Lanfear resisted the urge to crush her to a pulp with the Power, she was weak, it would not even be a challenge. "Well sadly my dear the world does take us down different paths, but you never know. I am told that the White Tower has lifted its age restrictions for novices. If you wished I could test you for the ability to channel."

Lanfear gave a theatrical shiver. "Oh, perhaps another time. There is just so much to do here, I had not realised when my father sent me that I would simply be so busy."

"Ah yes, I believe the Queen does truly value your assistance. That was why I was going to ask you a favour." Bennae hesitated. "There are some truly fascinating works in the Royal library, but I have found that the wheels of bureaucracy turn slowly and I am struggling to be allowed access."

"No!" Lanfear gasped, "they would not obstruct an aes sedai. Surely not."

"No, of course not, I believe it is just an oversight. However, you have the ear of the Queen and you see her regularly, if you would be willing to just mention it, it would smooth things over ever so much. I do hate to trouble her, she is such a busy woman."

Lanfear did not need to think hard. Ingratiating herself with the fool woman would allow her to keep an eye on her and if she was busy browsing through the dross that filled this Age's libraries then she would have less time to make a nuisance of herself. "Of course Bennae sedai. It would be my honour to assist you, please, just let me know if there is anything else I can do."

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Bennae seemed to alternate between bumbling around visiting old friends and reading in the Royal library. However, to Lanfear's irritation she seemed to also have taken a liking for her. After she had used some of her influence with Queen Tenobia to get Bennae into the library, Bennae had started to regularly invite her for tea. Of course it had hardly been difficult to influence Tenobia, she had not even had to apply further compulsion to the woman. She had only been using the smallest, subtlest webs, her unmatched dexterity coming into play. Now she was restricting even that to only the greatest of necessity. She doubted any of the channelers here had the skill or ability to detect subtle webs of compulsion, but taking the risk would be foolish given her orders to remain undetected.

"It is very brave of you to be here." Bennae leant forward and lowered her voice. "The Shadow is growing ever stronger and I believe it is trying to undermine Queen Tenobia and the Light right here in this palace."

Lanfear gasped, if she had not already been holding saidar she would have embraced it. As it was, she was ready to crush Bennae like the bug she was. "Surely you do not mean darkfriends, here? Saldaea has always stood with the Light."

Bennae nodded. "I know my dear it is a worrying thought, but the Shadow is pernicious. Sadly darkfriends do not carry banners or reveal themselves. Given your closeness to the Queen I had hoped to enlist your aid. A terrible task for any of us to have to undertake, but it is for the Light."

Lanfear nodded, letting worry show on her face. "Of course, anything. The Shadow cannot be allowed to bring Saldaea down." This was excellent. It was a pity that the woman seemed to actually be trying to do her job rather than palm it off on Taija's minions, but this would give Lanfear the opportunity to extend her own influence. If she wanted someone gone, then what better way to do it than to frame them and go running to the 'wise', 'old' 'aes sedai' for help.

"Thank you my dear, I know that the prospect of fighting the Shadow can be a terrible one, but all of us must band together or else we will be in quite the pickle."

That suggested… "So you are asking others for aid too?"

Bennae blinked, looking surprised for a second. "Well of course, unity is one of the Light's great strengths. Working together is how we will defeat the Shadow." She had probably read that in some idiotic book of insipid moral philosophy. Still, that was interesting information and foolish of her to reveal. Lanfear would need to be more careful, assume she was also being watched by the people she was watching. Not that she had been anything but careful.

Of course, things were never as difficult as they might seem when she had her strength in the Power. While it would no doubt result in punishment for failing in her mission, if things did go wrong she could simply slaughter her way out of Maradon and no one would be able to even slow her down. Turning Tenobia against the Light might be the goal, but killing her and plunging Saldaea into chaos would do as a consolation prize. Perhaps she might even be able to frame the Hall of Servants for it.

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"I do not understand why you are here Bennae sedai." Queen Tenobia stared down at the grey haired, ageless faced woman from her throne. "While you are welcome to peruse the Royal Library and the White Tower's aes sedai are always welcome in Saldaea as guests, we are perfectly able to manage our affairs without the interference of the White Tower, or the Hall of Servants."

A few gasps could be heard from the people in the throne room, but mostly her words were simply met with nods. Lanfear allowed herself a moment of satisfaction, one she carefully did not reveal on her face, as she saw Bennae's eyes tighten slightly. Her plans were going well.

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If she did not find the bumbling woman so irritating, Lanfear would have been gratified at the way that Bennae seemed to have decided to take her into her confidence. As it was, well at least she was on the inside track on the efforts to fight the Shadow here.

"… So I believe that Lord Alinen may be a darkfriend, but it is hard to believe it of the dear man. Given everything he has done for the Light."

Lanfear did not to have to feign surprise. It seemed that Bennae had actually found a true friend of the dark. Not a particularly important one it was true, but nevertheless. It seemed the woman was not completely useless after all. The question was, what to do with that information? She did not need to think for long. "That is… Beyond shocking, but if you truly believe that then… it must be investigated. What can I do to help? Do you wish me to involve the Queen? He is a popular man, so it would be dangerous to make an accusation without either cast iron proof or her backing."

He was no one of importance to the Shadow. She would happily throw him to the wolves to place herself above suspicion. There was no risk of him being able to reveal her and she could always have him killed once he had been taken. Or do it herself.

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"You are accusing one of my most loyal lords of being a darkfriend, a man who has been a friend of my family since my birth. I hope you have more than adequate proof Bennae sedai. As it stands my inclination is simply to have you removed from Maradon for the insult you have just presented."

Lanfear watched Bennae wince at those words and then the woman started to make her case, more confidently than Lanfear had expected. There was little of the bumbling scholar about her now, just a confident and neatly laid out case.

As Bennae started, Lord Alinen shouted an outraged protest, but was silenced by an upheld hand from Tenobia. "You will have your chance to speak in your defence later." Bennae smoothly continued, until eventually she drew to a halt.

Queen Tenobia frowned, "I am unconvinced. Lord Alinen, do you have anything to say?"

The man nodded furiously. "I have nothing but respect for the aes sedai," not Bennae in particular it would seem, Lanfear sympathised. "However, Bennae sedai is gravely mistaken. Everything that she has said is circumstantial. My record serving Saldaea and the Light speaks for itself, there is no real evidence against me because there cannot be, I am not a darkfriend. I shall answer each of her accusations in turn…"

Tenobia cut him off. "There is no need for that Lord Alinen, I believe Bennae sedai is mistaken. Unless she has anything more to say for herself it may be best for her to return to the White Tower."

That was Lanfear's cue. If Bennae was sent away then who knew might be sent to hunt her next. Better the semi-competent devil she knew than a possibly much more dangerous new opponent. "My Queen, if I may?"

Tenobia frowned, "of course, speak."

"I believe that Bennae sedai is correct. I have been conducting my own investigation of Lord Alinen and, while I did not believe that I had enough to come to you by myself, what she has just presented supports everything I have discovered. I also have some additional things of my own to add to it."

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Of course Bennae had invited Lanfear for tea after Lord Alinen had been dragged away. "I am most grateful for your efforts my dear. I am not sure that the Queen would have believed me alone, whatever I had said, so being able to have you step in like that was surely beneficial to our cause."

"I am sure she would have, everyone knows the value of an aes sedai's words, especially when she speaks of the Shadow. Queen Tenobia is a wise woman."

For some reason Bennae had invited the ridiculously named initiate, Blade, to their tea this time. It had taken Lanfear a little while to work out who she really was under the illusion over her. Dangling Zarine Bashere here under the nose of the Queen was impressive, presumably to be used as a political adviser. When Lanfear had worked that one out a few weeks ago her assessment of the Bennae's competence had gone up a notch.

"Of course, but it is still frightening to think about, but we Saldaean women are strong as is the Queen. We shall hunt down any of the traitors working with him and they too will face the executioners' block."

"Indeed, I shall be taking part in his interrogation later today. Would you like to accompany me my dear? I would value any insights you can provide."

Excellent, she would be able to hear exactly what Lord Alinen revealed and strengthen her position in the centre of the Light's efforts to root her out at the time. "Of course, I may have ideas for questions to ask him that would not occur to an outsider, no offence intended Bennae sedai."

The woman laughed. "Just the truth my dear, that is why I invited you. Your insight will no doubt be highly valuable."