One Night in Kandor

[Bree]

(mood music One Night in Bangkok)
Zacharyn took the lead from Ubriel as they stepped through the Gateway from Cairhien and pointed them straight at the small village a short distance down the road. Badovinci was a small village just north and west of Chachin. The road before them was well travelled and paved with hard packed clay. They picked their way in the failing light down the side of the hill to that road and then mounted their horses. Zacharyn said, “The house and forge share a yard near the center of the village. We will have to ride through the main street to get there.” He did not sound excited by the prospect.

Zacharyn led them down through the street. There were few people still out and about in the dusk of late evening. What had been a brisk evening in Cairhien was absolutely frigid in Kandor. There was no snow on the ground as yet but the air smelled like it held enough to drop some with the slightest provocation. Ubriel looked around, greedily taking in the details of the town where Zacharyn had grown up. She looked at the form of the buildings and the clothes of the women. She took note of the smells in the air and the sounds of the birds and the people and the dogs. She began recognizing a feel of Kandor and she associated it with the feel of Zacharyn’s company. It gave a personality to the place and she at once felt keyed up and excited but relaxed and content.

Ubriel began to take note of the few people here and there that pointed and whispered with their neighbor. A couple of young boys took off running when one of them seemed to recognize Zacharyn. When they finally rode within site of the forge yard and house that was their destination, she once again saw the boys. They were standing in the yard with a small group of people. There was an older couple that Ubriel thought must be his parents. With them were a younger couple with two small children and two teenagers. The older woman was nearly bouncing on her toes, pulling her shawl tighter around her shoulders. Her husband stood behind her rubbing her shoulders vigorously and licking his lips in his own nervous and excited dance.

Ubriel wanted to close the distance between herself and her fiancé; take his hand and stand proudly with him. But she didn’t. She waited. She stayed quiet and tried to stay calm and retain her dignity. At some point these people would know who she was and when they did, she wanted them to see her as the self possessed Gaidar that she was. Not some addlepated half wit with dreamy eyes for her big strong man. So she waited. And that cough or two was only because she had dust in her throat from traveling.

[Zack]

It was a rather tense moment. Zacharyn hadn't seen his family in years. Writing occasionally didn't really qualify as keeping in good contact, but he looked at them all staring at him as though he were a paragon. How he hated it when they would look at him like that. It made Zacharyn feel as though he had no right to be looked at with appreciation or adoration. Zacharyn shook the glum mood threatening him away and stepped forward a bit. "Mother." He began. "Everyone, I would like to introduce you all to Ubriel Bryne. Gaidar and Mistress of Training of the Grey Tower." Zacharyn motioned for her to join him. As she did so Zacharyn wrapped his arm around her waist and snugged her closely to his side. "Ubriel has also accepted my proposal of marriage. We have come together to ask you, all of you to join us in a small town in the south of Cairhien, Ubriel's home town, for our wedding ceremony." Zacharyn finished holding tightly to Ubriel.

No sooner than Zacharyn had motioned for the short muscular woman did Pol Mael'din's hands reach for her mouth, and tears began streaming from her eyes. Zacharyn's father seemed to beam proudly at him. Looking at his father Zacharyn gave a slight pause. There were still nights when he would wake in cold sweats to the nightmare of his father being torn apart by the explosion.

Shaking himself from his thoughts, Zacharyn stood firm looking at his parents and siblings. He was waiting for them to react.. Waiting for them to do anything really…

“Well lets meet her then!” Zacharyn’s older sister Kaci broke the ice for the whole ordeal. No sooner had she spoken than all three girls were walking over and babbling about what Cairhienin wedding traditions were like. They pushed themselves between Zacharyn and Ubriel, widening the gap between them and breaking his hold on her as they went. The last he saw of her as they hustled her toward the house was a wide, guppy fish face working desperately to make words as she was swept away. Rory looked between the two and took up the reins of all three horses and walked them to the stable.

Zacharyn’s father and brother led another man more slowly out into the yard and with one hand on his shoulder, his father said, “Let’s go talk in the forge. Give the ladies some room.” He led the way. “This is your brother-in-law, Ric. Kaci married him and brought him home not long after we parted ways in Illian.”

Zacharyn looked to Ric and tried to gauge the man’s mettle. Ric caught the look and said, as he went to the cupboard in the back of the forge to retrieve several shallow metal cups, “I think she just missed you, to be honest. Now that I have a good look at you, I can see my resemblance to you. When you left, she had to go fetch home a new son to work your father’s forge.” The giant grin on the man’s face took away any sting the word might have had and Zacharyn found himself looking at the fond smile his father directed at the man.

He thought to himself as he took one of the cups of brandy that his father had poured, I can’t be upset to see my family happy.

“We missed you son.” His father raised his cup and said, “To weddings.”

“And wedding nights!” Ric added.

Bruster laughed more heartily than perhaps was called for but it called Zacharyn’s attention to the boy“And wedding nights!” Ric added.

Bruster laughed more heartily than perhaps was called for but it called Zacharyn’s attention to the boy who had become a young-man in the time he had been away. Bruster was seventeen now and it was obvious that he spent very little time in the forge. While Ric carried the broad shoulders of a man who spent his days swinging a forge hammer and working a bellows, Brus was thinner. His lean muscles were long rather than corded and bulky. Zacharyn grinned and joined the toast. “It is nice to meet you Ric. I am glad that Dad wasn’t left without a helper.” Turning to Brus he said, “What have you taken to? You dont look like you’ve been swinging a hammer or pumping billows. What have you been doing to get so fit?”

Brus looked back and forth from his father to Ric and a faint spot of color tinged his cheeks. He looked down to his toes and when he looked back up he said, “I have been working as a mason with Master Kiel. He was a Dedicated of the Black Tower before he and his wife and their daughter stepped out of a whole in the air and came to live here. They moved here just about four years ago and he started laying bricks for folks. It was about half a year before folks realized his supply of bricks seemed to replenish itself. We eventually all got to know them well enough and when it came out that he was using the male half of the One Power to help make those bricks and get them laid, well, it just didn’t seem to matter so much. We hear the rumors of the Taint being cleaned and Master Kiel confirmed it.”

“Plus his daughter, Laren, is quite pretty. That probably helped you warm up to him.” Ric was very obvious and brusque with his jokes. Zacharyn kind of liked it. It would be hard for him to not realize it if this man tried to insult him.

“So you have a sweetie?” Zacharyn held his cup out to be refilled.

Brus grinned and shuffled his feet. Their father smiled and said, “Laren is a very pretty girl and Brus may decide to ask her to Beltine or Sunday this year. For now, Brus is learning to be a mason and I am very proud of him.”

Zacharyn was well pleased that his family was doing well. That would make leaving them and going back to the Tower easier. He had often worried about them and wondered if they were okay without him. Particularly he worried about his father. Having met Ric and seeing how they had all settled into their new roles in this life, his fears were put to rest. He took his third cup of brandy and began to tell them about Ubriel, Peach and the Grey Tower.who had become a young-man in the time he had been away. Bruster was seventeen now and it was obvious that he spent very little time in the forge. While Ric carried the broad shoulders of a man who spent his days swinging a forge hammer and working a bellows, Brus was thinner. His lean muscles were long rather than corded and bulky. Zacharyn grinned and joined the toast. “It is nice to meet you Ric. I am glad that Dad wasn’t left without a helper.” Turning to Brus he said, “What have you taken to? You dont look like you’ve been swinging a hammer or pumping billows. What have you been doing to get so fit?”

Brus looked back and forth from his father to Ric and a faint spot of color tinged his cheeks. He looked down to his toes and when he looked back up he said, “I have been working as a mason with Master Kiel. He was a Dedicated of the Black Tower before he and his wife and their daughter stepped out of a whole in the air and came to live here. They moved here just about four years ago and he started laying bricks for folks. It was about half a year before folks realized his supply of bricks seemed to replenish itself. We eventually all got to know them well enough and when it came out that he was using the male half of the One Power to help make those bricks and get them laid, well, it just didn’t seem to matter so much. We hear the rumors of the Taint being cleaned and Master Kiel confirmed it.”

“Plus his daughter, Laren, is quite pretty. That probably helped you warm up to him.” Ric was very obvious and brusque with his jokes. Zacharyn kind of liked it. It would be hard for him to not realize it if this man tried to insult him.

“So you have a sweetie?” Zacharyn held his cup out to be refilled.

Brus grinned and shuffled his feet. Their father smiled and said, “Laren is a very pretty girl and Brus may decide to ask her to Beltine or Sunday this year. For now, Brus is learning to be a mason and I am very proud of him.”

Zacharyn was well pleased that his family was doing well. That would make leaving them and going back to the Tower easier. He had often worried about them and wondered if they were okay without him. Particularly he worried about his father. Having met Ric and seeing how they had all settled into their new roles in this life, his fears were put to rest. He took his third cup of brandy and began to tell them about Ubriel, Peach and the Grey Tower.

[Bree]

Ubriel found herself ensconced at a kitchen table much like the one in her mother’s house surrounded by Zacharyn’s mother, two sisters, niece and nephew. The niece and nephew were too young to be of any great concern but taken altogether they seemed to have a menacing aspect sitting across the table from her. She listened to them babble for a few minutes, honestly not really talking to her, about her or even caring if she heard them. It was a kind of female rallying technique, touching base with each other and preparing to present a united front. Ubriel was served a cup of hot tea with a strange astringent flavor over-layered with a minty, woody flavor. It was unfamiliar to her but she was poured her cup from the same pot that the others were drinking theirs from so it must be safe.

Finally, Pol asked, “How did this great love affair between you and my little boy begin?”

So this is how it is going to be? Ubriel sipped her tea to give herself time to gather her own fortitude and prepare to battle in a way that she had not ever, even once, trained for. Thinking back to when she met Zacharyn in that courtyard in Illian, how they had danced and gone shopping, spent all day and night rambling around the great city and talking about everything, and how they had parted ways never expecting to see each other again; Ubriel knew Malindah was hooked before she ever got to the first day she had spent with him working on Al’Doondieb in the forge. By the time she got to the part where she had taken that full day’s ride not long after earning the fancloth cloak and she had told Peach all about her disappointment and being so certain she would never hear from Zacharyn again except incidentally around the Tower grounds, Kaci was hanging on every word. The teapot had to be refilled three times and Ubriel didn’t bother to hold back the tears or the laughter where it was called for in her story.

“You laid an egg!?” Kali was leaning on the edge of the table with her head resting on her folded arms at just the right height for her short little four year old legs as she stood there. Kaci’s youngest child, Kali’s little brother had long since fallen asleep and was snoring softly on a nest of blankets in the other room on the floor before the hearth. Ubriel grinned at Kali and nodded, sipping her tea as Kaci picked up the girl and carried her into another room to put her to bed.

When Kaci got back and was once again taking up her place in the Wall of Judgment that Ubriel was facing, Ubriel said, “Then I got word that the Aiel had once again swarmed over the Dragon Wall and my home town was directly in the path of the destruction that had been reported. I didn’t waste any time going to check on my mother. My good friend, Asha’man Rory, and Zacharyn both jumped quickly to volunteer to accompany and assist me. The news was rather better than I had feared. When we arrived, my mother, in her way, had taken in a full town of her own in orphans. You will see if you come with us to Cairhien to attend the ceremony. It is a bit of a mess but it is the kind of mess that my mother thrives on.”

Pol nodded and waved her hand at the idea that they would not attend, “Of course we are coming, but tell me, how is it that Zacharyn is going to marry a woman who is trained to be the physical protector of … well… that is to say…”

Ubriel knitted her eyebrows together, at first quite unsure what the problem was. Then she understood. “He is a respectably strong channeler of the One Power. I could probably take him in a fair fight of muscle and skill. However, there will never be such a fair fight. If I ever got on his wrong side, he could tie me up and hang me from the ceiling until I promised to behave.”

Kaci sniggered at that and Pol made a face of distaste. “I don’t know if it makes sense for a woman to be that much more physically adept than her husband.”

Ubriel sipped her tea, an inkling of the idea of what was bothering her soon-to-be mother-in-law beginning to form in her mind. “Your son is a powerful man. He has the skill and strength to dominate most men and women in combat. I am a somewhat small person. When he stands beside or behind me I sometimes feel insignificant, as if his presence alone could swallow me whole. If I didn’t have the depth of study that I possess in various combat skills, I would never stand a chance if he and I were to come to opposition in a fight.”

Ubriel watched the pride in her son gleam in Pol’s eyes. “But I do. But just like I have that depth of study and skill in combat, your son has a skill I can not hope to ever dominate. He can channel. On top of his raw muscle and size, his power in the Source makes it foolish for me to ever consider actually trying to fight him. Your son is a powerful man.”

Pol lowered her gaze as the gleam of pride became a smile that lifted the corners of her lips and threw her shoulders back. She shifted in her chair and crossed her legs at the knee. Adjusting her shawl and skirts and fidgeting in general, she said, “Well, it is good for a woman who wishes to become his wife to be able to acknowledge that.”

Kaci stared at her mother briefly before rolling her eyes and shaking her head. Lifting her gaze back to Ubriel she asked, “What is it about my brother that makes you want to marry him?”

Ubriel heard the click as her brain shut off at the question. The dull hum of the blood flowing through the vessels in her temples nearly drowned out the sound of crickets that she hoped were singing outside. Swallowing the lump in her throat, she said, “Well, that is a really good question.” She started to try to list the reasons she wanted to marry him and then abandoned that as too hard and so tried to talk herself out of it… That usually served to bring all of the reasons she had for doing a thing rushing to the defense of the decision to carry through with the doing.

“He is slightly dingy. He tends to forget where his is and what he is about if he is not reminded. He tends to mull over his troubles and have complete conversations about them without once inviting me to participate. He has once abandoned me and refused to speak to me for two years and then came crashing back into my life demanding to be given complete access to the heart he previously walked away from.” She began to worry, the supporting arguments were not rushing to the fore. Then, “He did not give up on that endeavor. He has borne repeated rejection from me since he returned even going so far as to abandon his studies, taking a leave of absence, in order to put himself in potential harm and accompany me to check on my family.

“He has been active in his volunteering of his time and talent to helping to make that situation better.” Ubriel breathed deeply and felt the tension of worry in her shoulders ebb. “He did, at the beginning of our original friendship, take bossy and grandiose orders from me. I must admit I was a little bit of a snot at the time and still he put the effort and time into making two of the most lovely pieces of weaponry I have ever hoped to own. He made a third for me just because he wanted to get my attention and apologize.” Ubriel felt the emotions begin to swirl in her chest and send shocks of cold through her veins.

“In the last few days, Zacharyn has taken every opportunity to be supportive and caring and to show that he is truly regretful for the time he wasted hiding from me and from his feelings. He earned my trust and has healed my hurts from it. I love him completely and hopelessly. I can not imagine allowing anyone else to ever bond him or marry him.”

She pushed her tea cup forward then and waited for someone to pour some more. Kaci and Lin and Pol all sat motionless as her words faded from her own ears. Darting glances between their faces and the tea pot and her cup, Ubriel finally reached to pour her own, muttering softly, “I’ll just let you think about that for a bit,” poured herself a cup and offered, “Does anyone else need more?”

[Zack]

Zacharyn and the other men had been at their man talk for a while, when the topic finally made it back around to his marriage. “Dad, I was hoping you could do something for me.” Zacharyn started. His father seemed somewhat curious about his sudden seriousness, but nodded for him to continue. “Will you help me get mother’s chain shawl. so I can gift it to Ubriel for our wedding. I want her to have a piece of our family’s history. So that she feels accepted and so she has a piece of my family with her. I also have a set of armor I’ve been developing for her that I’ve designed around that shawl…” Zacharyn trailed off hoping for the answer he wanted.

Karl Mael’din was at once amused. “Son, I’m sorry, but your mother had hers tailored to her when I made it. It’s not actually passed down, but the making of a chainmail shawl is what has been passed down. I made your mother’s, My father made one for my mother, even Ric has taken it up, and made one for Kaci. You’ll just have to make her that piece as well.

Zacharyn looked somewhat crestfallen, “I was hoping to have it for the ceremony, it would take me days to make a full shawl at this point.” he said, running his hand through his hair. He was so wrapped up in the disappointment he felt that he at first failed to notice the looks the other men passed to each other. Bruster stood and began to gather some hand tools and Ric walked to a bin at one side of the racks along the wall. The movement and noise got Zacharyn’s attention and he looked up, immediately becoming confused. “What are you doing?”

Karl chortled and said, “Son, I said the making of it has been passed down. We are going to teach you tonight.”

The men spent several hours making the individual links of steel from several long lengths of the metal thread. It was not a complicated process after all. As they worked, they talked, Ric and Karl sharing wisdom of married men with Zacharyn. Some of it was in jest and some was completely serious. Zacharyn fared about as well as Bruster did in trying to tell the jest from the truth.

As they fitted the steel links together in long chains and clasped them closed, Zacharyn thought the process might go faster if he warmed the metal and made it more malleable. As he did so, he began to see the threads of Fire and Earth weaving into the metal and suddenly they would thin and straighten, then move on. He watched it for a time, realizing this was akin to what he had always been doing without realizing it. He made note of it in as much detail as he could, intending to ask Rory about it when he got the chance.

It was almost no time at all when the whole piece was finished. A long diamond shape that opened to a collar in the middle so that when she wore it, the collar would fit snuggly around her neck to be tied in the back with a cord of leather. The long points in front and back would reach just past her navel and hips, and on the sides they would reach over her shoulders and midway down her upper arms. When they began to put things away and clean up their work, Karl hung the piece from a wooden bar and suspended that from the wall. Zacharyn grinned and said, “One last thing.” Using a thick cord of Fire, he heated the whole of the piece at once and then quenched it in a smothering wall of Air. The smoldering piece slowly took on a blue hue that was unmistakable even in the low light of the forge at night.

All of the men stood there and looked at it in admiration, patting themselves in congratulations, before heading to the house to join the women. It was late in the night but the lights were still gleaming through the windows and the smell of hot tea and sweet rolls drifted through the air as they approached.

[Bree]

Ubriel looked up as the door opened and was pleased to see Zacharyn with the other men coming through the door. They looked as if they had been drinking and Zacharyn was flushed as if from some kind of exertion. Karl moved over to Pol who rose to greet him and, taking her in his arms, he bid them all a fond good night. Pol tossed a quick set of instructions back over her shoulder, “Lin, set Ubriel up to bed down with you. Brus, you get Zacharyn squared away in your room. Goodnight!”

Ubriel smiled at the obvious concern of propriety in the instructions and then she whipped her head one way then the other, “Where is Rory?”

“Who is Rory?” Bruster asked.

Zacharyn frowned and said, “He is the Asha’man that we Travelled here with.”

Ric nodded, “Oh right, I saw him leading the horses to the barn. I will just go check on him.”

Ric went quickly back out the door as Bruster poured himself a cup of tea, heavy on the honey and milk and picked up two sweet rolls. He turned one upside down atop the other and crushed them together in a nearly flat cake and dipped them in his tea before eating them. Kaci frowned at him and handed him a napkin which she immediately regretted when he said, “Thanks!” with his mouth full. A rain of disgusting bits of wet and gooey tea and sweet roll mash splattered across the table, sending both Lin and Kaci into fits of reprehension.

Ubriel choked on her tea and coughed through her laughter. She had seen far worse at the tables in the Warders’ Mess Hall. Zacharyn looked as if he were somewhat embarrassed which made Ubriel laugh the harder.

Ric was back before long but Rory was not with him. “The old man was passed out cold in the hay between the back two stalls. I invited him into the house but he muttered something about being close to the action and rolled over. I think the old codger was dreaming.”

Ubriel could not take anymore. She could barely catch her breath and was getting dizzy from laughing so hard. “I think it may be time for us all to go to bed.” And with that, Ric scooped up his sleeping son and Kaci carried their bleary-eyed daughter. Bidding them all a good-night, they left for their house on the other side of the forge yard.

Ubriel grinned one last time at Zacharyn as she followed Lin up the stairs and into a bedroom and Zacharyn went the other way down the hall and into a different bedroom. Ubriel felt the warmest tingling sensation in her chest as she bedded down with Lin who kept calling her “Sister” with all the delight and enthusiasm of one who truly meant it.

[Zack]

Zacharyn heard something. He was not sure what it was, as the sun-drenched field where he and Ubriel were playing was filled only with butterflies and foxes. Neither of those really made any noise to speak of so he was highly confused. The noise came again. It was insistent and it was terrifying. The dream shattered.

Zacharyn was suddenly roused fully from his dreams. A stray scream in the night had finally pulled him from his slumber and alerted him to the thick feeling of the air around them. There was a foul smell emanating from everywhere at once. “Bruster get up! Get up you brick headed dolt!” Zacharyn pulled his brother out into the floor. He made a hollow thud as he hit and sat bolt upright.

“Light Zacharyn, what is wrong with you?” He said starting to lift himself up.

“Do you know how to fight? Do they still give lessons to the young men in the village?” Zacharyn asked adamantly.

Bruster nodded his head. “What does that have to do with anythi...” Bruster was cut off as more screams from outside came; guttural, strangled sounding yells with them. With his eyes wide he looked at Zacharyn and stood up. “It’s been years since they’ve come like this.” The two of them made their way downstairs and out the front door.

Zacharyn stepped out the front door and panic gripped his heart. He was suddenly back within the arches of his raising ceremony and feeling the full force of watching the trollocs take his sister once more. Zacharyn grabbed hold of Saidin and pulled on it harshly, filling himself near to bursting. “Bruster step inside and grab a weapon, find something to defend yourself with.” The power of Saidin welled inside of him allowed him to see more clearly and to hear more effectively. It even allowed him to smell the trollocs around the corner. Stepping further out into the yard, Zacharyn caught sight of Rory at the barn and watched as he tossed skillfully woven fireballs at the heads of each trolloc he saw. I can do that!! Zacharyn thought excitedly as he watched Rory weave. Fire, encapsulated in a dart of Air that was woven to spiral as it sailed through the air in order to drill into its target before the Fire was released all at once.

Zacharyn wove a practice copy a small distance away just in case, before he hurled it at a trolloc attempting to ram through a door down the street. The dart entered, and… exploded just as it should have. Zacharyn claimed a small victory dance in his head before continuing to assail ever more of the horde of grotesque beasts.

Bruster had claimed weapons for the two of them, and was making his way back to Zacharyn when a ram headed trolloc came running from beside the house bleating at the top of its lungs. Bruster readied himself to attack the trolloc, but before it could get close enough, an orb of light forced its way into the trolloc’s head, stopping it in its tracks. The beast slumped forward slightly before its head burst in a small explosion. Bruster stood terrified of what he had just seen and turned slowly toward his brother. “Blood and ashes, Zacharyn! What in the Light was that!?”

“Watch your mouth! Mother is still around here somewhere, if she hears that you’ll be sitting softly no matter how old you are.”

Zacharyn continued to throw fireballs as quickly as he could weave them. Somewhere outside the part of himself that was focussed on the One Power, on that fight for life against the Source of what made it all worth the fight, he thought to wonder where Ubriel was. Just then he heard her, as if by the divine machination of the Pattern in answer to his thoughts. She was somewhere near the barn and yelling for Rory. Turning with the intention of closing some of the distance between them, Zacharyn continued his fight, both internal and external, and saw his sister Lin come running out of the house. She carried two light swords, one slightly shorter than the other and rushed, headlong into the fray taking down two of the snarling beasts in her path as he watched.

The void shook. My sister, too!? I am surrounded by women who could beat me senseless. The brief distraction almost cost him dearly but he was saved by Bruster wielding a cudgel. He had apparently abandoned the one he had intended for Zacharyn upon seeing the flying fireballs and Zacharyn nodded his thanks to his brother as he refocused on the fight at hand.

[Bree]

Ubriel had jumped from the bed and raced to the window at the sounds of shouting men and screaming horses. Dogs snarled and barked loudly somewhere in the mayhem. Some snarls, more guttural and grotesque, echoed through the fog dense streets and Ubriel heard one of her own rise up in her throat at the sight of trollocs setting homes ablaze and laying about them with wicked and ghastly weapons. Ubriel bade Lin to hide under the bed if she was not able to fight and, without waiting to see what the girl would do, ran from the room and down the stairs brandishing her Clobber, the shield fastened to her left forearm.

Ubriel wasted no time trying to figure out where everyone was. She knew from studying the works of the greatest master generals in history that trying to track down Zacharyn before she addressed the threat would only give the trollocs more time to do damage. She could best defend him by making sure that, if he was not already dead, none of these beasts had the chance to make him so. She had taken the habit of sleeping in a shift with divided skirts as if it were made to wear under a riding dress since the night the Warder Hall had been invaded. She had managed to have some clothes on that night herself, but one of her fellows had embraced the encounter entirely nude. It was not a thought she enjoyed being reminded of.

Ubriel thought first to make her way to the barn and find Peach. She turned that direction and saw Rory come striding out of the open barn door like a man half his age. He wielded small but explosive balls of fire and threw them with deadly accuracy at the heads of the shadowspawn. Where one hit, it seemed to melt its way into the flesh for a moment before exploding with a fury. Ubriel took all of this in while crossing half of the distance to the stable. Then her eye was caught by the sight of Kaci carrying little Luc and holding Kali’s hand when a boar headed Trolloc scooped Kali up, ripping Kaci’s grip off of her. It began to run away. Kaci screamed and reached a hand out toward them. The trolloc’s ears began to bleed. It dropped Kali and threw its hands up to its head. It fell writhing to the ground. Kaci ran to pull Kali away and stared murderously at the thing. It burst into flame.

Ubriel saw all of this, still running for Peach, axe in her right hand, shield on her left forearm. Rory was making a mostly clear path for her as she ran but there were five trollocs in her path that she had to dispatch for herself. The first had a head like a man but with a pig’s snout and cloven hoofed feet. It wielded a long chain which it held by a handle of wood. Ubriel dodged the chain on its first pass and swooped down beneath it to run straight into the thing’s stomach as it bent over to reach forward to sling the chain. It being overextended and off balance, she had no trouble flowing through and bringing her axe up to slice cleanly through the thing’s stomach. The rancid stench of its bowels assailed her as if from a distance as she passed through looking for the next obstacle to her path.

Time seemed to slow and she saw and observed more than felt and experienced the carnage around her. The next creature and its fellow were both of a strange rodent type of mixture of features and they were handling the opposite ends of a hempen net. There were bright flashes of light as the fires gleamed off of the metal surfaces of hooks and spikes embedded in the net. Ubriel feinted a charge toward the twin demons and they swung the net toward her. She reached out with her axe and let it find purchase in the leading edge of the net. Careful not to bring it too close to herself, she pulled as the beard of the axe hooked through one of the net’s holes and she stepped quickly backward. The sudden, unexpected movement brought the net bearers close to each other and off-balance so that a sudden shove forward with her shield had both of them toppling over. She twisted and the axe disentangled itself. She brought it down on the closest head. A quick flip upward took the other trolloc through the throat with the corkscrew spike jutting from the backside of the weapon.

Leaving the tangled and gorey pile where it fell, Ubriel barely had time to straighten before she was set upon again by a trolloc with goat horns. This one was bare-handed and she dispatched him with almost no thought and the axe’s tooth through its face. She was almost in the stable yard at this point and a smaller, almost child sized trolloc came out of the shadows. The roaring and vile obscenities that it aimed at her were startling. She shouted at the top of her lungs, “Rory! I have a present for you! Rory!” She began to parry the knife swipes the creature was windmilling at her with both hands. “Rory if you want this thing, come get it or I will ha…” A gust of wind like an overstuffed down pillow seemed to buffet off of the trolloc and slam into her. It had the effect of knocking the thing unconscious at the same time that it separated Ubriel from its attacks.

Rory came up and said, “Sorry, Dear. I didn’t hear you at first.”

Ubriel tossed a furrowed brow and puckered look of exasperation in Rory’s direction and turned on her heel to run the three paces into the barn.

[Zack]

Zacharyn continued to throw fireballs when there was any distance between himself and the beasts, but as he strode through the tide of fur and teeth, he found himself occasionally too close. Bruster was instrumental to him then, wielding the cudgel to open up that space once more. “You should not be out here in this mess. You would be more useful up in the window of the house!” Bruster jerked his head back toward the house to their right and behind them. His eyes darted and he winced at fights that he refused to enter so that he could stay near his brother.

Lightning crackled and roared down the street at the height of a man’s head. It forked this way and that. Zacharyn could see the Weaves of Air and Fire that had created it. Everywhere that it forked, it lashed out to hit a trolloc and the trolloc crumbled dead.

Bruster was suddenly torn in his wish to protect his brother and his concern for the mason’s daughter. “Zacharyn, I need to go check on Laren.”

Zacharyn understood that feeling and nodded. He watched the boy turn and run down toward where the lightning had been coming from. Zacharyn tried to form the new weave. The static crackle that popped in his hand as he pulled the thick funnel of AIr and Fire felt like a briar being brushed by his palm. He found that holding one hand in front of the other as if her were holding a log, turned that funnel and it was the most natural thing to send it spinning out and down the street to seek its targets.

Lin screamed from somewhere to his left and Zacharyn pointed that funnel that direction, running at the same time.

[Bree]

Peach was stamping her feet and rolling her eyes. Ubriel paused a moment to wonder if she should saddle the horse before riding her into battle. I will need stirrups to do what needs to be done. Ubriel slid her Clobber into its place on the underside of her shield and took Peach by the halter. “Come on, we don’t have time for brushing, I promise to brush you completely twice tomorrow.” Ubriel threw the saddle blanket and saddle up onto Peach’s back and pulled the girth strap tight. She did not bother with reins as she and Peach did not need them and her hands would be full anyway.

Climbing into the saddle, Ubriel took the moment to press her hand to her friend’s neck. “Light guide and protect us both! Carai an Sul’Cuebiyar!” As Ubriel lay nearer Peach’s neck the horse burst forward and pressed into the fray outside. She squeezed the horse’s ribs with her legs, pressing slightly higher on the opposite side to which she wished the horse to turn and leaning in her desired direction. The strength of her squeezing and the shifting of her weight in the saddle giving Peach all the instruction she needed to move in the correct direction.

At first, Ubriel simply directed Peach to run through the masses of trollocs as she herself swung her axe to great effect. Then she heard the crying children and the mothers all wailing. There was a group of them off toward the main well in the center of the town. A group of trollocs had surrounded them, about thirty women in all, each with one or two children. The trollocs had begun to dart in and try to rip the children from the women’s arms.

Ubriel lay low over Peach’s neck and the two of them charged, Peach turning as they arrived so that the broad side of her body crashed into the back of the wall of beasts. Ubriel swung her axe as they collided and cleanly cut the head from the shoulders of one of them. She kicked out with her foot at another and was gratified to hear the crunch of its neck snapping as her foot connected with its jaw and wrenched it sharply around.

From that place in the center of the mess, they were vulnerable. Ubriel shifted her weight forward and her feet back and felt Peach respond. She kicked out behind her sending another of the beasts flying into several of its fellows. Peach responded without hesitation to every suggestion Ubriel made from up on her back. Together they wrought destruction on the beasts.

The women were not idle. Half of them handing children off to others to huddle against the well. The ones with empty hands began to pick up rocks and fallen trolloc weapons and two or three together would fall on one of the beasts.

Ubriel grinned as she and Peach moved forward for the next engagement.

[Zack]

Following the sounds of Lin’s screams, Zacharyn finally happened upon the alleyway she had turned down . He had arrived just in time to watch as his sister was being set upon by the Myrddraal that must be leading the attack. The disgusting thing licked it’s maggot fleshed lips and grated an icey laugh. It sounded almost like gravel being poured from a wheelbarrow in its roughness.

“You’ll make a nice treat for the other myrddraal before being a quenching bag at Thakandar.” the half-man said. The words oozed out of him like pus from an infected wound.

Lin became visibly shaken by the message, and Zacharyn was the embodiment of frozen hatred.

“You’ll not have a chance.” Zacharyn said, forming the same weave from before. A static charge building strongly in his hands and the hair on his and Lin’s heads lifting slightly as the air around them began to reflect the Fire and Air being woven around them. The myrddraal’s blank eyes widened slightly as it just began to rush forward. Becoming startled by the sudden movement, Zacharyn began rushing through the rest of the weave. He couldn’t stop half way or else he’d risk hurting anyone nearby. A single unarching bolt of lightning jolted from the air onto a spot near where the half-man was once standing and left scorched stone and a deafening crack. Zacharyn cursed as he couldn’t direct his weave where he needed to and watched as Lin parried a seemingly lazy thrust from the myrddraal.

“I’ll be a treat for no one! Especially a Light forsaken shadowspawn!” Lin yelled, slicing at the myrddraal with the blade in her right hand. The gravelly dark laughter came again just as the half-man raised his sword in time for Lin’s blade to land against it. Without a single sign of strain the half-man took a step back and he was gone. Simply there one second and gone the next.

Zacharyn was speechless. The half-man disappeared into nothingness. Zacharyn was near frantically taking in his surroundings now. He watched as Lin haphazardly regained her balance after her target had disappeared. Behind him he heard a soft gasketing noise as though air had just been sucked into something and turned in time to catch the myrddraal stepping back into existence. A hastily woven shield of air managed to deflect the myrddraal’s sword and he was suddenly missing again.

Furiously, Zacharyn pulled hard on the One Power. He had overextended himself tonight with hastily recreating all the weaves he was watching. Some of them he was probably doing incorrectly and he was wearing quickly. All that was keeping him going right now was his anger and Saidin.

Turning quickly, Zacharyn called to his sister. “It’s going to come from beh…” he cut off as he watched the half-man seep back into being near Lin. She had managed to understand and dodged to the side, but not quickly enough to escape completely. The myrddraal managed a superficial cut on her right shoulder.

As the myrddraal came down it’s blade gliding off of Lin’s skin, Zacharyn struck out with flows of Air in order to envelope it from head to toe. Even completely immobilized the vile being managed a self satisfied near-smirk at the cut it had left on Lin. She wasted no time in jumping seeing the creature immobilized. She spun like a dancer and lashed out with her longest blade, severing the curdled milk colored flesh at the neck. The head rolled, eyeless gaze not losing its spine tingling nature. Zacharyn watched it thrashing still, headless, in its bonds of Air and decided to tie off the bonds and leave it there.

He beckoned to his sister, “If this thing had the trollocs bonded to it,” he said as he turned.

She cut him off, “I am Kandori, too, Brother. If they were bonded, then they will have died too.”

They reached the mouth of the alley and peered out into the chaos of the street. A new flash of lightning like a striking snake forked past them and split to take two trollocs in the back. Looking in the direction from which it had come, Zacharyn saw a man he had not met. I really need to introduce myself to that mason.