As usual speech in italics is in the Old Tongue.
Chapter XV - Old Enemies
Taija's mind was serenity within the torrent of saidar flowing through her. Burning hate and gibbering fear both ruthlessly suppressed as weaknesses that would only get her killed. With excruciating caution, showing nothing on her face, she started to build a complex, inverted web of all five elements, coming together in intricate patterns around a solid core of fire and spirit.
The web was almost there, all of the Power that Taija could draw funneled into it, just the very last flows to add.
Carefully she shifted her horse moving gently sideways until a few seconds later she was as well positioned as she was going to be. Mierin's white and silver clad back a few metres in front her, none of the men potentially getting between them.
A small breath in, a small breath out and Taija brought the web together. There was no warning. Between one instant and the next a blinding bar of fire as thick as a man's leg blasted out from her straight into Mierin.
But something must have warned her. It took a tiny fraction of a second for the beam of balefire to pass through where Mierin had been sitting, but even as Taija finished her web the Forsaken was already diving off her horse.
Taija swept the blazing liquid fire down and across clipping Mierin's horse, which simply ceased to exist, but Mierin just managed to roll under it, scrambling away.
Taija didn't hesitate. If she did she was dead. She was probably dead anyway. With a scream of frustrated rage she released her web and dove off her own horse, frantically channeling, hoping that Mierin had been stunned by her own fall. Lightning struck from a clear sky, once, twice, three times, the air around the woman erupted into fire and razor sharp blades of focused air shredded the space she was in.
For a brief moment Taija thought she'd succeeded and then she felt it. Her webs were pushed back by a sphere of clear air around Mierin before they were cut, making her wince as the flows snapped back into her.
It was a struggle for Taija to keep hold of her emotions when she saw Mierin straightening up, not untouched, there was mud sullying the pure white and silver of her dress and she was wincing a little, but certainly not seriously injured. Whatever inverted web Mierin had had over herself was released and suddenly Taija could see her blazing with the light of saidar, brighter than she'd ever seen in anyone else.
She'd had one shot at her, just one shot and she'd missed. Now she was probably going to die.
Rand, Hurin and Loial were still blinking away the afterimage from Taija's balefire, trying to work out what just happened, but for her and Mierin all that mattered was each other.
Mierin smiled languidly, seemingly relaxed, but Taija could see the rage bubbling behind her eyes. "Well that was unexpected, a surprise attack from behind without any warning. Presumably from one of this Age's so-called aes sedai. I could almost admire it. If it had succeeded." She leant forward slightly. "I will need to deal with you of course, you really have made a mess of my plans." She glanced at Rand as she said that. "But first, please, tell me. How did you know? Or are you simply so jealous that you could not stand young Lews Therin even speaking to someone more beautiful than you?"
Taija resisted the urge to bite her bottom lip and forced herself into a casual sounding chuckle, "Really Mierin," she deliberately used her first name, as if they were friends. "I should have guessed you'd be here, sniffing after him, despite everything. You've been a joke for a while, but using illusion to make yourself younger so that you can seduce a teenage farmboy. Now that really is pathetic."
As she said the last word Taija was already moving, a gateway snapped open behind her. and she dived through it to cover behind an outcropping of rock, throwing an assortment of air, earth, fire and water behind her in several webs. She didn't expect any of them to hit and none of them did. She was already running even as the spot she'd traveled to vanished in a burst of white hot fire.
Taija stayed out of sight, never stopping, even as explosions walked along the rocks behind her, shattering the cover she might have hidden behind.
Eventually Mierin's burst of temper subsided and Taija carefully climbed onto a boulder so that she could see over it towards her. She was already breathless, clearly she needed to spend more time training. As for Rand and the others, she was praying that they'd had the sense to get away from Mierin, but was worried they hadn't. Of course her fears were confirmed when she saw them still staring wide-eyed at Mierin, apparently too stunned to think about self-preservation.
Fine. She just needed to keep Mierin's attention on her for long enough for them to wake up and make an escape.
Taija carefully spun an inverted gateway behind and below her, just out of Mierin's sight.
"Well that was rude Mierin. I see you still haven't learnt how to control your temper. I'd have thought that after you humiliated yourself at Lews Therin's wedding you might have worked a bit harder at it." Taija knew it was dangerous trying to push Mierin's buttons, but she couldn't afford for the woman to stop focusing on her and start thinking about the men.
This time Mierin didn't let loose at Taija. Instead her eyes narrowed although fury still simmered in her voice. "Who are you? How do you know these things?"
Finally the men started to back away from her.
They just needed a little more time… Taija replied, switching to her own language. "Foolish woman, why would you think you were the only one of the Chosen to be free. When the Great Lord triumphs only one may rule beneath him."
Mierin's laughter was annoyingly lovely, tinkling across the battlefield. "Oh ho ho ho, you'll have to try harder than that!" She gave Taija a considering look. "You speak the Common Tongue properly though, not like the fools from this time. A southern accent perhaps? Maybe…"
A second later Taija staggered as a shield slammed into her connection with the Power. The strength was incredible for anyone without an angreal. Intellectually she knew how strong Mierin was, but having to face it head on was a different matter. She frantically pushed back, clinging onto her connection to saidar before slicing Mierin's web. Taija realised the trick a second too late as Mierin's own web of fire and spirit sliced through the inverted webs concealing her ability and identity.
Mierin paused before she spoke, her eyes widening with surprise. "Taija Kosola. You survived." Her tone was utterly flat.
Talking meant more time for the others to escape, it also meant longer before Taija had to pit herself against the most powerful woman of her time. "Disappointed Mierin Eronaile?" She lengthened the sound of the second name, emphasising it. "Also, did you forget my full name during your time with the Dark One? I suppose prison can hurt your manners. I'm surprised Elan Morin Tedronai," she put more weight onto his third name, "didn't help you there. He always was a stickler for politeness despite everything else."
Rage flashed through Mierin's eyes and she took an angry step forward before she reined herself in and chuckled lightly. "Well I suppose I can live with you having one small victory over me. It hardly does much for the balance between us does it?" Her laugh didn't reach her eyes. "Anyway it seems like a fortuitous day for me. Not only have I found Lews Therin, I also get to rectify the pattern's mistake in letting you live. I really did think he had got you, but you always were hard to kill, slipping away like a little cockroach." Taija was vaguely aware of Rand and Hurin watching clueless even as they edged away, while Loial was mouthing words, seemingly trying to decipher their words.
"And you always were a psychopath Mierin. You're pursuing a teenage farmboy and making yourself look his age to do it. How old are you now? 300? 350? Grooming is such an innocuous sounding word."
"Well it is more enjoyable than entertaining the myrddraal. They do have their needs," she smiled and paused, "as Nerina could have told you."
Reason fled from Taija and with a scream of rage she let loose with saidar, dividing her flows into several attacks. She was too angry to think about cover or evasion, she just threw everything she had at Mierin. Conventional attacks flew at the woman, blindingly hot fire flowed over her, red hot shards of earth exploded from the ground and razor sharp, inverted whips of air lashed at her from behind. At the same time Taija threw a significant proportion of her power into a more esoteric web, desperately inverting the flows as she spun them together, briefly altering the physical constraints of a space beside Mierin to fool the pattern into thinking a star's worth of matter was packed into a tiny spot.
Mierin stood there, unruffled, as the webs exploded towards her. Webs were sliced, snapping back into Taija, only to be replaced by more. Her inverted gravity well actually made Mierin shift a step to the side as it briefly pulled on everything around it with inexorable force before she casually unraveled it. Nothing else even phased her.
After a couple more seconds of shrugging off Taija's assault, Mierin raised her eyebrows, switching back to the local language. "Is that really all you can do Taija? I had forgotten how weak you were. Maybe it was just rose-tinted memories from back in the good old days. Even then you would not have been foolish enough to try to face me though. I suppose you might have become over confident after being around the children they call aes sedai in this time." She pretended to think, tapping her chin with a finger. "A gravity well is a somewhat creative use of what power you have, maybe worthy of a talented doctoral student, but…" Her face darkened, "why would you think it would work on me? I was spinning webs like that for a century before we even met! I am a better physicist than you ever were and you know it. It really will be satisfying squashing you like an insect, I always was annoyed that Ishamael got there first."
As Mierin was talking, Taija was panting for breath and trying to carefully edge back behind her cover without being too obvious about. Slowly she formed the webs for a trio of inverted gateways against the rock face she was using for cover, safely out of Mierin's sight.
In front of her Mierin turned to Rand. "Well… As usual Taija seems to have popped up to ruin things for me, still one must make the most of a situation." She sounded both fond and frustrated when she spoke to him. "I think you and your friends should run along now. We can speak more later. Here… Well you are not ready for a conflict of this kind and I think one thing I can agree with little Taija on is that neither of us wants you dead. Remember Lews Therin, you are mine. Now go!" She gestured imperiously, but gave him what looked like a genuine, loving smile. If Taija had the mental energy to spare for it, she'd have been disgusted.
Rand looked towards Taija and she nodded before calling out, "there's nothing you can do here, not with one of the Forsaken. Mierin and I need to… have a vigorous conversation and you'll just risk getting hurt. Just remember… everything I've told you." She nearly said 'remember me', but she wasn't going to give Mierin the satisfaction.
She could see Rand was torn, but when she shouted "go!" he wheeled his horse towards the south and spurred it away, trailed by Loial and Hurin. She could see he kept looking back as he went, but nevertheless he rode on.
Taija suppressed a shiver as Mierin stared wistfully after him for a few moments, before turning back to Taija. "Lews Therin always did have a soft heart. Such a pity." She shrugged lightly. "Well, is there anything you would like me to pass on to the others? No, well that is…"
Taija cut her off in mid-sentence, completing her webs and feeling as much as seeing the gateways snap open. Two opened behind Mierin and she channeled, drawing as hard as she could on saidar, sweet spikes of ecstatic pain prickling behind her eyes. Through one gateway inverted air and water formed a razor sharp disc of ice flying for Mierin's neck, through the other a blinding beam of balefire shot out, the web inverted and the very air around it seeming to catch fire as she swept it sideways. At the same time she flung a simple of web of air, earth and spirit towards Mierin, visually impressive and taking up a lot of space, but with little real power behind it.
Even as Taija channeled, Mierin dived aside out of the way of the stream of balefire, slicing the other webs she'd thrown at her. Taija however hadn't waited to see the results of her attack, already diving through her third gateway, reemerging a couple of hundred metres to the right, behind a large boulder. Not a moment too soon as she saw her previous cover disappear in a whirling ball of fire.
A second later Mierin turned towards Taija and air and fire streaked through the air while something pulled at the earth under her. She sliced Mierin's webs without even thinking about it and threw her own back, frantically mixing elements and webs, some inverted, in a complex series of simultaneous attacks chained together. She knew hardly anyone had the dexterity or skill to invert webs at combat speed in the way she could, but it seemed to be meaningless here. Everything she could do, Mierin could counter and return with even more power behind it.
Explosions of fire and earth, bursts of air and more esoteric detonations rained down around Mierin as she deflected or sliced Taija's webs. She didn't even move a step, just effortlessly batting away Taija's attacks and then retaliating with her own.
Taija was running, changing location every time she sent a series of webs at Mierin. Light damn the dress she was wearing! She knew that if she stayed still she was dead, but she was still having to slice or deflect more and more of her attacks as she went.
Despair was sinking its claws into Taija. She was throwing everything she had and Mierin was barely even affected, her only expression a growing smile.
An explosion on Taija's heels made her trip and fall, a frantically opened gateway at least letting her tumble away, out of the area of the next blast. Blades of earth and fire sliced through rocks around her, barely missing her and her own attacks were petering out as she had to focus fully on defending herself.
Suddenly the rock in front of Taija was literally tossed aside. How strong was that woman?! Mierin standing there, looked completely unruffled other than the mud on her dress from her earlier dive. It was a stark contrast to Taija's panting, bruised and singed self.
As they faced each other Mierin's smile only grew as webs sprang forth from her. She was just throwing simple attacks now. Almost half-heartedly, yet they were still horrifically strong. Taija couldn't meet any of them head on, instead having to dodge slice and deflect. She was just playing with her at this point!
Fire exploded around Taija and was quenched in air and water. An inverted web shot towards her and was sliced by spirit and fire, felt rather than seen. Razor sharp air was deflected into the sky. But Taija didn't spot the inverted whip of air coming from the other side which slammed into her with an agonising crunch, sending her rolling across the rocky ground.
Then there was a shield battering against her connection to saidar, cutting into the flow of the Power before she sliced the weave. Taija would never give up, especially to Mierin, but she knew she didn't have much left in her. With a supreme effort of will she forced herself to try one last gambit.
Taija dove to the ground under Mierin's next web, dodging it but leaving herself immobile and vulnerable. She ignored the flare of pain in her arm. It might be broken. It didn't matter. She drew hard on saidar.
Mierin seemed to have paused, waiting Taija with cruel curiosity. She didn't have time to do more than that though. A moment's calculation and again three gateways opened in front of Taija, the last of her strength going into forming a web of all five elements.
A finger-thin bar of balefire blasted out. Through the first gateway, which opened behind Mierin. But Mierin was already moving as Taija's web came together. A graceful step out of the path from the first gateway.
An instant later the dodged beam of balefire was multiplied into three as it passed through Taija's other, subtly angled, gateways also blasting through the space to the left and right of where Mierin had stood.
Somehow Mierin turned her smooth step into an undignified fall when she realised what Taija had done, but it was enough. Before she could try to adjust the beam of balefire, the flows slammed painfully back into her as Mierin sliced them.
Straining against exhaustion Taija clung on to her hold on saidar, barely, and threw a web of fire, air and spirit that would set the air in Mierin's lungs on fire while she clambered back to her feet. She could see that now Mierin was truly angry.
Taija's web was casually sliced and then an overwhelmingly powerful fist of air grabbed her and flung her away, towards the rocks behind her. She could see a shield following it, about to cut off her connection to saidar.
She couldn't focus, but she had to. Channel. Now. A frantically formed web opened a gateway behind her and Taija flew through it impacting on the bed in her room back in the dingy Caemlyn inn she'd spent too many nights in with an agonising, boneshaking crash. The shield slammed into place just as she did, cutting her off from saidar and then instantly vanishing with the gateway it had just ended.
Someone started to scream.
Taija looked up from the ruins of the bed with bleary eyes and just before she passed out she saw a woman in her underwear gibbering in terror.