Echoes ... (Attn: Bella/Lysira)

The everyday life of the inhabitants of the Grey Tower. This board is for general daily roleplay around the Tower, in the corridors, rooms and halls that make up most of the building.
Jack
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Echoes ... (Attn: Bella/Lysira)

Post by Jack » May 28th, 2020, 8:06 am

Jerid Walker Asha'man (PSC) The Asha'man's gold-green eyes glittered in the afternoon sunlight shimmering through the windows of the alcove he sat in. He sat quietly, his face covered by the cowl he consistently wore, the only thing showing his eyes.

Three weeks he had been back and every day brought something new. The only thing left unchanged was the dusty and closed off apartments he once kept in the Tower prior to his abrupt departure from the Tower. It had been a spartan room when he left, though he had planned a different departure altogether in those days.

Whispers of his return had already circulated in the Tower from the moment he entered the gates of Hama Valon and ordered Tower Guard back out and demanded a Yellow Asha'man accompany them. The captain at the gate was a grizzled veteran who knew the channeler's voice and the gaze, and knew better than to argue with a command from him.

It was perhaps the first time in several years that anyone from the Grey Tower had knowingly set eyes on him. For years beyond what he could recall, he had dreamed of coming home, but other things kept him at bay. His own crusade and vendettas cost him everything in the end.

And now, he sat … every day in a different spot, watching the Tower grounds beneath him. Some places were old spots in the Gardens, a time or two in the Channeling Yard, or in the Indigo Ajah's garden.

There were few people in the Tower these days who knew who he was and those that did would be hard-pressed to track him down. The Asha'man had lived his last few years in perpetual caution, a reflection of his past life.

And now he sat, today, in the alcove overlooking the Gardens. He wasn't alone of course. A Sa'Ji'Van was within ten feet of him, obscured from sight. The young woman had been assigned to him, a request on his part and to keep some people pacified that he was being responsibly watched.

Of course it was a different escort every day. They'd kept one person on him more than one day and he'd provided difficult to track.

A ringed hand brushed the cover of an old leather book, a journal of his from years ago. The worn volume was closed, his fingers tapping it ever so gently. He knew every word written in those pages, every letter inked in its fine parchment.

Could see every moment he recorded with vivid clarity. In the end, all that remained of him would likely be words on parchment, dispassionate details of an Indigo Asha'man's life.

In the end, it would be all that remained of his life. Echoes of a distant memory, written in ink on pages that told the story of an Asha'man whose history reverberated throughout the these halls and beyond.

Tap, tap, tap. Gone were the days when his name was spoken, however, except as a cautionary tale. He preferred it that way. The less people who knew him beyond stories, the better.

He'd come home to live in peace. His wars were over. His past behind him, what remained of his future in front of him.

When it boiled down to everything, Jerid Walker Asha'man was a better man when he returned home. And that was how he wanted to be remembered.

The Indigo's eyes lifted and he caught the reflection of the Sa'Ji's movement in the window. She had tensed slightly, her hand gripping the broadsword at her side.

A heartbeat later, his mind flooded with an alert as the simple Ward he had set around the area was tripped. Saidin coursed through him, the icy maelstrom a balance he knew how to master well.

But he made no move for the long knife at his side. Instead, he continued to tap the journal in his lap, the gold leafing of the jade ring on his ring finger catching in the light.

He saw the slight relaxation of the Sa'Ji in the reflection, enough to know it was no immense threat on his part. Or at least that she knew a would-be known assassin. That person was also smart enough to keep out of sight of the window's reflection.

“In the end, all we are are reflections of what we once were,” the Indigo murmured. “Echoes on the wind and in the halls.”
Jerid Walker Asha'man
"We all suffer. It's how we move past it that defines us."

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Bella
Female Channeller Representative
Posts: 5615
Joined: April 14th, 2015, 11:28 pm
PC: Miahala Darrow Sedai
SC: Lysira Viathene Gaidin
TC: Gareth Tomosan Asha'man
QC: Natlya Cade Gaidin
QC: Andraste Alhandra Sedai
Location: New England

Re: Echoes ... (Attn: Bella/Lysira)

Post by Bella » June 6th, 2020, 6:49 pm

The Grey Tower had always been alive with rumors. Whenever there were large groups of people, the tongues did wag...

It became something of a game to figure out what was real, what was false, and what lived somewhere in between. It seemed that the in-between place was where most of them lived, since all rumors began somewhere and somehow. Some rumors seemed to spring to life more than once, and there was one that had circulated its share of times already.

Lysira had heard rumors over the years that a...certain Asha'man had returned to the Grey Tower after a very insulting and abrupt departure years ago. She had cautiously investigated the first of them, but subsequently ignored the rest.

Until now.

Something about it was different this time, and she had felt it. She pursued this one, and there were few things that could avoid the diminutive Gaidin when she really set her mind to tracking it down. Hunting and tracking were, after all, one of her strongest skills since she was very young. Skills she had only honed rather than let rust.

This was why she was in the gardens now. She saw the guard before the guard saw her, if only a moment, but nodded to put the young woman at ease before moving in closer to the cloaked figure. It was a sight both ominous and innocuous. She moved closer, her boots making little sound on the grass as she moved around to face him.

Lysira Viathene Gaidin stood and waited for him to look at her. To see the face in the cowl and know, see with her own dark eyes, if this rumor really did have flesh.

Jack
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Joined: May 25th, 2015, 9:01 pm
PC: Malcym Ashe

Re: Echoes ... (Attn: Bella/Lysira)

Post by Jack » June 7th, 2020, 12:46 am

Tap, tap, tap. The fingers began their rhythmic dance once more on the leatherbound journal.

Whoever approached him was good enough to avoid the reflection, but the expression in the Sa’Ji’s expression was one of ... curiosity as he waited for his visitor.

The Asha’man knew better than to think it an enemy agent or so would-be assassin. There were few left alive who would want him dead.

And if there were any close by ... they would have to wait in line for the best hunter in all of creation. Time could be a fickle creature, but she was effective.

One nearly as effective was now in front of him and took not one thought about blocking the reflection of his escort for the day.

He didn’t look up at first, but his eyes caught those slender hands, likely calloused from so many decades of pulling a bowstring or handling a sword.

Tap. Tap. Tap.

He would once have sensed any approach from a half-mile away and not batted an eyelid. But that sense had long since wrapped up and buried in the back of his mind, a perceived act of bittersweet mercy... or perhaps in hindsight cowardice.

From beneath the cowl, his lips twitched for a heartbeat, almost if wanting to form a smile. It vanished as an old memory sprang to mind. It was old, from days long gone by and too many years past that he had forgotten.

It was much like his age. He had stopped counting the years of his life decades ago.

A young woman, in her early twenties, in a dark blue dress on the dance floor of the Band of Brothers Inn, moving with a near unearthly grace.

“I remember a woman with hands such as those, in hand with another’s, so many decades past at the Band of Brothers in Elman’s Creek,” a voice rasped, its Ebou Dari accent unmistakable. “They were both so much unknown in the Tower at those days, except by those who knew them or what actions occurred during the Battle of Lights ... both not knowing the path they would one day share”

His gold-green eyes danced as the memory flooded back. The man had just been named Master of Soldiers by the Hall of Sitters, but instead of celebrating the earning that night, he had instead sought simple solace at the inn.

“They moved as they had just met, both graceful, both trusting enough to know one was not playing the other,” the Asha’man said. “She was small, slender, eyes like dark pools, wearing a dark blue dress. He was probably nearly a foot taller, gold-green eyes and dressed in a brown coat.”

“The music could have been performed in the halls of kings or great families ... they also shared a meal and spoke ... he with words and she with flashes of the hands ... and when she paused, those hands rested on her collarbone as if to lessen the need to keep raising them to speak.”

So many different dances in his life, both before, during and after this place had been his home. But things were different now. Elman’s Creek was gone, likely swallowed by the growth of Hama Valon. The Band of Brothers ... who was to say what became of the inn as the city grew into its splendor, built and rebuilt after the attempts to destroy it failed.

His hands moved, opening the journal to a specific page, a specific portrait. The journal held hundreds of pages. One of ... he had forgotten how many he had kept over the years ... there were shelves of them in his chambers, more than he had years in his life.

The portrait was a detailed drawing of a woman, colored ... something that wasn’t inexpensive. A young woman, in a dark blue dress. Large, dark eyes, a few errant strands of long dark hair tucked behind an ear, hands resting on her collarbone.

Beneath it, was a brief description. Mouse Gaidar, graceful dancer, Light bless the channeler who becomes her charge.

He the journal on the bench and his calloused hands suddenly flashed. One hand was the jade green ring he was known so well for wearing, the other a gold ring, simple but elegant ... a band from a past life, a past wedding that took place in the Caralain.

But those were different people, different times, he signed. Those two changed ... they changed the world in some ways ... and the world, this place ... effected them.

He paused, his hands folding briefly. “The only difference was that he forgot everything except a personal war he could never let go of, even for the sake of loved ones and the place he called home and in the process hurt those he loved.” He paused briefly and smiled bitterly. “The Creator has no mercy for those types of people. Nor would I imagine there loved ones.”

After a moment he lifted his head. The deep cowl obscured everything but those gold-green eyes until he lifted his hands to push it back.

An ageless face, one that had not seen much time ... one might have seen nearly forty winters pass, peered out. It was a face many once knew ... and now likely very few in this place. It was expressionless, as much as the gold-green gaze that met the large, black eyes of the woman staring back at him. A few more age lines, but the same length of chestnut brown hair, with only a few grey ones gracing it. His ageless face seemed a tad paler than the normal tanned one of decades past.

“Hello, Lysira Gaidin,” Jerid Walker murmured. Other words had been on his lip to describe her, but those words might have well resulted in a sword through his throat should she feel a certain way. Creator knew it would not be undeserved.

OOC: Description comes from the fanfic "Road to a Bond: Part One."
Jerid Walker Asha'man
"We all suffer. It's how we move past it that defines us."

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Bella
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Joined: April 14th, 2015, 11:28 pm
PC: Miahala Darrow Sedai
SC: Lysira Viathene Gaidin
TC: Gareth Tomosan Asha'man
QC: Natlya Cade Gaidin
QC: Andraste Alhandra Sedai
Location: New England

Re: Echoes ... (Attn: Bella/Lysira)

Post by Bella » June 7th, 2020, 6:57 pm

For a moment, one that stretched somewhere between half-a-heartbeat and eternity, Lysira just stood. And stared.

Her eyes, once dark and terrified like prey, were now gone from those days and her gaze was nothing but a predator. The Darkness slunk around the edges of her mind, unable to read if this was a moment when it would be freed or not. Truth was, she didn't know the answer to that either...so she let it slink around her.

'So it is you.' Her expression gave all the tone needed to the signals of her hands. For once, the rumors were wholly true.

She couldn't tell if she was relieved or disappointed about that. She couldn't tell what she thought about the man standing before her. How many times had he broken her heart now? Oh, yes, she'd lost track. Although she reflected on the fact that she'd let it keep happening, and that it even could still happen.

Would it happen again now?

'Jerid Walker Asha'man, I did not imagine to ever see you again.' To her credit, she neither drew a weapon nor leaped forward to punch him in the jaw. Good for her. So far. 'What brought you home this time?' Her face remained expressionless. Cold in its impassivity for a man she'd been married to, bonded to, bore a child to.

Jack
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Re: Echoes ... (Attn: Bella/Lysira)

Post by Jack » June 7th, 2020, 8:58 pm

Jerid Walker knew the look in the large dark eyes that stared back at him. He had seen them a time or two when she had been cross with him ... or when she was evaluating a potential threat against her charge.

The masked knot in the back of his skull was best kept that way, lest he become awash in whatever anger or cold emotions boiled beneath the likewise icy exterior. The tone of her silent language made it clear.

It was perhaps best to keep his own emotions in check ... and other things as well ... and from her to dampen this somewhat unexpected reunion. Lysira was one of the reasons he only visited one spot when he let his chambers.

For all the love they had once shared, for the history they shared over the years, and the child -- one was right to be bitter and angry with the abrupt departure all those years ago. Light knew their son shared some of that anger.

But then an Aes Sedai had once remarked that Jerid Walker could evoke the deepest hatred and powerful love and every emotion in between. It an apt statement that evolved with age and with those whom he loved or bonded.

He recalled every name, every face -- every heartwrenching decision or bittersweet moment that was caused them to part ways

The Asha’man could also count on two hands the people he had bonded over time, the reasons those bonds had dissolved. Three times death had snapped clean a bond. Erin, his first love, killed before him before he came to the Tower. Then there was Catieri al’Cardyn Sedai, the mother of one of his children, a son he would never see; she had been killed by the Black Ajah. Sienna Calin Gaidin ... she died during Jerid’s previous departure from the Tower at the hands of a Dreadlord ... before he had bonded Lysira a second time.

It was a channeler’s curse. If those non-channeler loved ones or Warders did not die from injury or assassination, time and age would claim them. On the opposite side of the coin, they would watch as the channeler did not age at all -- or very slowly.

“Sa’Ji’Val, please provide me Lysira Gaidin and I with some time to speak privately for half a candle mark,” he said aloud, his gaze never leaving the Gaidin’s. Or the hands with which she spoke with ... or could kill him.

He could hear a cough of objection behind him. “With respect Asha’man, my orders are to ... “

Jerid’s eyes flashed and he suppressed a sigh. And then he turned his gaze from Lysira to look at the dark-haired trainee. His gaze was harder than steel, a flash of the old Asha’man that had once resided in these halls.

He did not enjoy repeating an order.

“You’ve your orders, lass, and I will be here when you return,” the Asha’man said coldly. “What words between myself and my Warder are for our eyes and ears alone.”

The trainee blinked and instinctively turned as the Asha’man turned back to Lysira, adding, “Besides, should she want me dead, she could strike before either of us could react. And it would be her right to do so.”

When he was sure she was alone, his gold-green eyes went back to Lysira’s gaze even as he closed the journal.

“I came home because it only seemed proper and it has been years since I left these halls,” he said simply, answering her question. “And I did not expect to see you -- had tried to stay one step ahead of everyone.”

Like many things, however, the Pattern had a way of throwing a screw in things. And time was a fickle creature.

“My battles are done, enemies dead and gone, and there is no more reason to fight,” he murmured. “This is the last place I felt at peace and instead to spend it that way while I am here.”

After a moment, his hands flashed. I’m dying, Lys. That is why I came home.
Jerid Walker Asha'man
"We all suffer. It's how we move past it that defines us."

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Bella
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Joined: April 14th, 2015, 11:28 pm
PC: Miahala Darrow Sedai
SC: Lysira Viathene Gaidin
TC: Gareth Tomosan Asha'man
QC: Natlya Cade Gaidin
QC: Andraste Alhandra Sedai
Location: New England

Re: Echoes ... (Attn: Bella/Lysira)

Post by Bella » June 14th, 2020, 7:01 pm

There had been a great many emotions jumping around in Lysira's head, bounding off the edges of the Darkness like hyperactive children trapped in a fence. His words, however, silenced all of them in an instant like a stern mother storming into their midst. They scattered and were stilled now. There was just the stern mother. The shock.

Her dark brows knit together slowly and she took a few steps closer to where he sat, lowering herself to her knees to be able to look up into the cowl that hung around his face.

'You are...' Her hands hesitated before she signed the final word. '...dying?' She almost didn't even understand the concept. This was a man who should have been dead a million times over by all accounts and yet had always cheated it. As a strong channeler, he was due to live a great deal longer than this. Outlive her. Their son. So how was this true? Was he somehow lying?

No, she didn't believe so.

'How?'

Jack
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Joined: May 25th, 2015, 9:01 pm
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Re: Echoes ... (Attn: Bella/Lysira)

Post by Jack » June 14th, 2020, 10:59 pm

Jerid knew that look that Lysira gave him. He had seen it reflected in the eyes of loved ones before.

Doubt. Surprise.

Of course, the ability to steal or dash someone’s own righteous anger streak was a symptom when it came to dealing with the Asha’man.

For the Indigo Asha’man, there were only a handful of times in his life when such glimpses touched his own eyes. Three times -- each in the death of three of his children, to think that their lives would be snuffed out long before they had a chance to raise themselves high or have families of their own.

Others, with loved ones whom he thought he would spend their final days with.

To see if reflected on him where it applied to him was a new experience.

And for some, it may as well have come as a shock.

The legends spun around him said he had cheated death while spitting in Death’s face, or provided a rude gesture to the Seanchan Seekers for Truth who came for him just before he ended their lives. After all, he had fought in at least three wars for the Grey Tower, waged his own wars against the Black Ajah and the Seanchan Empire. There were a few who credited him -- wrongly so, he thought -- as being one of the most skilled battle channelers in Tower’s history.

And at the core, free of Three Oaths, he would live long beyond even his great-grandchildren, and if he survived the final battles against the Dark to come, into the Fourth Age.

Legends were one thing. The reality, especially as a kneeling Lysira looked up at him, was a far more interesting construct.

“You did once say those blasted Portal Stones would be trouble for me,” he said with a faint, mirthless chuckle. He cocked his head, his gold-green eyes dancing back. “Or was it someone else who said that? So long a life, it’s hard to keep track ...”

Those last words were an apparent fib, something Lys would likely know. The Indigo’s memory was as sharp as a Power-forged sword -- and like such constructions cut so sharply, one could feel its sting.

On instinct, he reached out to touch Lysira’s face with a jade-ringed hand. It felt almost like a dream, the sensation of something he had gone without for years after his departure.

“As I said,” he murmured, withdrawing his hand, “my wars are over, my enemies dead. It took years ... but after that, there was but one thing to do ... and I left this world for others.”

The Portal Stones had always been more than a pastime for Jerid Walker. While nowhere near the expert some of his fellow Indigo had been on the ancient relics, he had studied them with a passion. It had also caused some angst and hardships with those he loved, including Lysira -- it was after all the reason for the separation of their first bond and as husband and wife.

“I couldn’t come home ... not without wishing to bring renewed danger to you or our son, so the Portal Stones beckoned ...” He smiled bittersweetly. “I saw things of what might have been, of mystery and shadow and light ... joys so wondrous that people would weep and nightmares so dark most would dare not sleep again without some source of light ...”

Jerid’s eyes flashed as he recalled those scenes. Always watching from the shadows, always flashing before his fleeting eyes as if he were but a ghost.

He was unsure even know if he had truly walked those worlds or simply borne witness to the events.

“I saw us ... what could have been had we left this Tower all those years ago like we intended ... more children, grandchildren. We -- they were happy. And I ... saw you dying of old age while this ...” he waved his hand over his own cowled face in demonstration ... “remained the same.”

What was taught and known and written about the Portal Stones by scholars and those specialists in the Grey Tower was that the Portal Stones could connect to other worlds, other lifetimes. Some lines of travel where no more than echoes of the world they knew, whispers of things that could never be because they diverged so far from this one.

The one he described ... was so real Jerid wished he could have lived it himself, but knew it was like his own Three Arches experience ... something never meant to be, only dreamed and best forgotten. In this life, Lysira and he decided to stay, he had never stepped down as First Seeker as he had intended ... and his daughter Bryn had died for the simple fact that she was his child.

“The Yellow who attended me said that somewhere along the line, I must have crossed a Portal Stone that was ... wrong ... and it infected me, like some blasted disease unknown,” he murmured. “It’s progressive, aggressive ... and slow enough to let me live my final days in peace. The Healer said there would be no pain ... so long as I don’t channel too aggressively.”

The Asha’man’s gold-green eyes were on Lysira’s black pools ... eyes that had drawn him and fallen in love with all those decades ago. Some questions he might be able to predict, others he knew were likely beyond his comprehension.

“The Healer said I would have at best three years to live ... and that her most positive assessment,” he murmured. “Her most objective prognosis was between one and two before I suddenly ... stop. My intent before then is to release our bond so ....”

Jerid did not need to say it. He knew that Lysira knew full well the impact a channeler’s death could have on a non-channeler bondmate. All those battles after he left the Tower and his wife ... they were waged with brutal savagery and stealth he had not employed since his days as a thief in Ebou Dar.

The weight of the words was nothing new to him. Jerid had known for at least a year that something was wrong with him. He had stopped using the Portal Stones two years ago and attempted to find some seclusion from the world in an isolated stedding ... one whose Ogier population was kind enough to let him stay in. Things came to a head when he left after a year ... and felt the weight of ages as he channeled for the first time in several months.

His eyes flashed and almost on instinct, grasped and squeezed his estranged Warder’s hand briefly before relinquishing it. And attempted to change the conversation.

“I met with our son while at Camden Corelle,” he murmured, looking at Lysira with pride in his eyes. “He’s grown into a remarkable leader and lord. His wife is amazing ... and bloody blunt for a Cairhienen noblewoman. She ripped me up one side for never having visited, skewered me for showing up unannounced and offered nothing but solid praise for you like a Whitecloak would the Creator ...”

He smiled softly. “Which is reasonable, I suppose.”

“Light but how times fly,” he added. “Four grandchildren, including twins, and a fifth on the way. A thriving legacy and township that survived the Caralain ...”

Jerid fell silent but his hands moved soon after. Thank the Light he takes after you, because trouble would have followed him if he was more like his father. The “tone” with which his fingers danced conveyed honest humor before stiffening ever so slightly. I also pray that our descendants never have to need to know this place except to visit or in stories.

For Jerid, it was his not-so-subtle way of hoping their son’s children would never channel and lead natural lives. One of the greatest curses a channeler knew was that they would go on long after their loved ones turned to dust.
Jerid Walker Asha'man
"We all suffer. It's how we move past it that defines us."

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Bella
Female Channeller Representative
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Joined: April 14th, 2015, 11:28 pm
PC: Miahala Darrow Sedai
SC: Lysira Viathene Gaidin
TC: Gareth Tomosan Asha'man
QC: Natlya Cade Gaidin
QC: Andraste Alhandra Sedai
Location: New England

Re: Echoes ... (Attn: Bella/Lysira)

Post by Bella » June 23rd, 2020, 9:15 pm

Lysira Viathene Walker just sat on her knees and stared. Barely a blink. Not an ounce of sound from her ever-silent form. She listened and inside her mind, like there was a tiny version of her in the arena of her thoughts, she screamed with the voice she did not have; she railed and ranted. Those damned stones... Even speaking of their son and his praise of him did not soften her.

She wasn't to cry, pull her hair, pull his hair. Pluck out his eyes and stuff them down his throat and--

The Darkness was trying to edge in, but she shut her eyes and bowed her head. She focused and calmed herself, pushing those storm clouds away from her mind. Now was not the time. She inhaled slowly, feeling a faint tingle from where he had taken her hand. His presence was like a heavy fog, and she felt it everywhere around her.

When she finally opened her eyes again, tears were streaking down her cheeks but the anger was gone.

What was the point? He was dying, and what was done was done. The past could not be changed. Part of her would if she could...while other parts of her would not. The Wheel wove... It was all meant to be. As much as she hated the man sitting in front of her, she only hated so much because she had loved so much.

'I wish you would have come home sooner,' she finally signed, letting out another long sigh. 'Can we spend some time together before you release the bond?'

Jack
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Joined: May 25th, 2015, 9:01 pm
PC: Malcym Ashe

Re: Echoes ... (Attn: Bella/Lysira)

Post by Jack » June 24th, 2020, 1:10 am

If it was one thing Jerid Walker knew well, it was his estranged Warder, his estranged wife.

There had been decades of absences that had separated the pair on more than one occasion, moments that broke their bond and sheared her trust in him.

And moments of happiness, years where they were blessed, even if they were cursed with the burden of some flaming war or unending struggle.

And in the end, it was partly that reason why he left more than 15 years past. After two centuries -- he thought that was right, he had since stopped counting after 150 -- he could not bear that pain anymore.

What were his options? In his mind at the time, it was a horrible choice. It was either lose another Warder -- lose her to enemies that kept hunting him and he in return hunted -- and stand over her broken body before waltzing away. Or it was to see those enemies defeated and watch as she turned old while he went on -- seeming untouched by time as the Wheel rotated.

Jerid recalled the words he had spoken to Miahala so many years ago, in her study over drinks as only old friends could share. The revelation about a Portal Stone encounter that had cut the first bond between Lysira and himself decades before. "Frozen" and "ripped from the Pattern" were the words a fellow Indigo had told him.

“I will never age, they said, that I will go on, long after loved ones are turned to dust and the Grey Tower in ruins, long after this Age is forgotten and rewoven... This version of me, this face, is the last one I shall ever wear ... I will live and I will die in this life, and that will be the end, save for what memories exist in this world.”

When he died, Jerid Walker would be nothing more than an echo in the Pattern, his memories and deeds and the legends that jumped up around him the only thing remaining on pages of books and scrolls. And as the Ages passed, even those would turn to dust.

Of course, Miahala had advised that he should tell his Warder that not-so-small secret, but he had withheld it.

And for fifteen years he had waged his wars alone. In them all, Lysira had been his only constant memory and that alone was for him to continue walking a solitary path, always sleeping in an empty bed.

He had seen worlds that might have been, ones where they were happy. Worlds of shadow and ones on fire, realities where the Grey Tower had never been because the two groups of Asha'man and Aes Sedai never met, pale imitations where the Dreadlord Lycos al'Sep had succeeded in the Sevenfold Conflict ... 

... and lives where the Indigo had never bonded or even met a Warder named Mouse.

All those memories and experiences and the guilt of his decision to leave without a word or explanation crashed through the empty void Jerid Walker Asha'man used as a barrier.

And it clashed with Lysira's look. The mix of anger and shock and other emotions he couldn't discern ... and then the tears as those dark eyes opened after closing briefly.

The combination pierced the opaque veil he had masked around their bond and after 15 years, emotions came flooding across the threads that joined the pair. And his surely must have reflected back -- for him it was love so sharp it might shatter Powerwrought steel or bright enough to blind a Fade. Loss and self-loathing, 15 years of regret and bitterness.

And Lysira's silent words cut deeper still, sharper than the knives he always carried. Pangs of remorse and reminders of why he loved her so much that he had in metaphor cut his heart out to feel no pain.

"Aye, I should have come home sooner, and shared a few more dances with that Gaidin who stole my heart all those many years ago in an inn in old Elman's Creek," he murmured.

On impulse, his body reacted. One thing had always been true of the Indigo Asha'man: he was quick, deathly so. In heart, mind and when it came to action.

In that moment, he pulled Lysira up and into a searing kiss, one borne of years of absence and longing and a sharp, deep love he could not find words to describe. Twenty heartbeats ... more and then he released her, his breath slightly uneven.

His gold-flecked forest green eyes stared down at her.

"We have a year together, a year to spend together," he whispered. "And for this channeler, my dear wife, that can be an eternity."

Even as he spoke, he pressed something into Lysira's hand. A green jade ring with gold leafing. A signature of his for more than 170 years, since before he was Raised to the cord.

His angreal.

While always a powerful channeler by nature, Jerid could have never survived half the battles in his life without it. And like a grizzled soldier who had seen too many campaigns, he was setting aside his most precious weapon.

"My wars are finished, enemies dead or burned, our son safe," Jerid whispered. "Wear this as my proof of those words and my love of you, dear wife, give it to our son, give it to the Indigo Ajah for the vaults or toss it into the sea. I am home, I am yours, whatever means I fit in your life now."

Jerid reacted again, a second kiss, softer and lingering. And then he kissed away the salty tears that had escaped his Warder's black eyes.

"I am yours, Mouse Gaidin, until this cycle ends and ever after as your thread is rewoven in the Pattern, ever driven by the Source the drives the Wheel," he whispered. 
Jerid Walker Asha'man
"We all suffer. It's how we move past it that defines us."

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Bella
Female Channeller Representative
Posts: 5615
Joined: April 14th, 2015, 11:28 pm
PC: Miahala Darrow Sedai
SC: Lysira Viathene Gaidin
TC: Gareth Tomosan Asha'man
QC: Natlya Cade Gaidin
QC: Andraste Alhandra Sedai
Location: New England

Re: Echoes ... (Attn: Bella/Lysira)

Post by Bella » July 1st, 2020, 3:10 am

Her body flowed with his, as it always had. Their romance had happened quickly, moving with the inexorable power and speed of a river carving itself through a mountain range. There was no resistance or hesitation. She felt him coming for her and she rose to meet him, returning the kiss with years upon years of uncertainty and loneliness, sorrow and inevitability.

And love.

Lysira might curse the Creator for prolonging this emotion in her heart long beyond when a smart woman would feel it, because as this moment happened upon them, she knew she still loved this stupid, bloody, flaming, woolheaded blockhead of a man. He kissed and spoke and kissed her again.

Her eyes held his as he spoke of the end, and of their togetherness.

Small but unreasonably strong hands gripped the front of his cloak, pulling him toward her before twisting at the last moment. Her weight followed him till his back hit the ground and she was over him. Kissing him again, this time on her impetus, she leaned up. 'For the time we have left, a day or a year, you are my husband and I am your wife. Nothing less. Nothing else. We cannot let more moments of our life be wasted apart, between now and the end.'

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