Fanfic:Anahi's Three Arches
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The First Arch
Rain was wet. This revelation, so simple that anyone else might have thought him daft for speaking it aloud, spoke to him. Before this storm, rain had meant being confined to his quarters where it could be experienced only through narrow windows, and certainly never felt. The women who had taken care of him wandered through it without it touching them, and all his life he'd seen people wander the rain without ever becoming soiled. Yet here he was, wet and shivering, covered in mud from his falls, and almost happy.
Happiness was foreign to him. Growing up there had been no need for happiness. Excitement came from being let outside, but even then there was a coldness to it. There was no purpose to his being outside, in what he understood now was simply a larger, more open prison. It was simply something that happened at a certain time on any day there was no rain. It made no sense to him, now, that he and the other boys had never been let out in the rain. Perhaps they would've been difficult to clean. Yes, they'd likely have tracked water into the rooms and gotten mud all over their clothes. That would've inconvenienced the caretakers.
Fear was another emotion foreign to him, but one he was becoming much more intimately familiar with. Happiness and excitement lingered as he discovered new things in the world around him, but fear was ever-present. Anahi had told him what would happen to him, spoken his fate to him as though any idiot must surely be aware of it. Her only answer for his fear of that fate had been that it was the natural order of things. That was simply how things worked, how they'd always worked, and how they were supposed to work, as shown by the will of the Pattern itself. There was no questioning of why his death was so perfectly acceptable that it should be expected, whereas hers was precious. That was simply the way of the world.
Yet here he was, seeing things the world should never have let him see, experiencing things he understood now that he should never been allowed to know of, and feeling emotions he'd only felt pale shadows of before. There was an exhilaration in being on the run, but fear and trepidation were paramount. The Ayyad would find him, he was sure, and if they didn't kill him they would drag him back to another village to resume his life of darkness and seclusion until they decided it was time he die. He simply could not accept that. Perhaps the instinct for self-preservation was something ancient and subconscious, but was strong within him. He could not die.
There were sounds coming from the road behind him. He was crouched behind a boulder, hidden by a few trees from the road that wound nearby. He didn't know if the people wandering the road and muttering miserably about the rain, as though there were anything in the world quite so wonderful, were simple travelers or tattoo-faced women searching for him, but it didn't matter. No one could see him. He was not safe anywhere, and had very little idea as to how to survive by himself, or where he might find shelter.
"The foreigners will pay dearly for this silk, of course," one deep voice was saying as the noises neared the rock he hid behind. "They have always been too dense to trade correctly, but they seem to have gotten worse lately."
Someone else made a sound that he thought must've been happy. Anahi had done something similar when she thought he was being funny, but it was something he'd never heard before that. "What shall we call ourselves this time?" another deep voice responded. "Shara is getting used too often perhaps. I've always enjoyed being a Qipin trader."
"By the Will of the Pattern, it is a good name, but those wormheaded foreigners cannot ever seem to pronounce it correctly," the first voice responded.
There were others out there, people obviously at odds with his own. This came as a shock to him. No mention of anyone other than his people had ever been made to him. His world was already a dozen score times larger than it had been, but there might be more of it out there. Perhaps these people felt differently about their Ayyad. Perhaps he might have more luck there.
Watching the ground carefully, he peeked out from behind the boulder. Through the trees, he could see a dozen or so men wandering by with a large wagon, not unlike the one he'd ridden in, but intact. If he followed at a distance, these men might lead him to someplace he could meet with these foreigners, someplace he might find acceptance. He would need to be very careful, but there was some small hope for him.
From the corner of his eye came a glint in the sodden light of the overcast day. An odd arch hung there between two trees. The way back comes but once, a voice said, almost in his head. What a strange thing to say, especially in his head. He had no desire to go back, for backward led only to death. If he didn't hurry up, he was going to lose sight of the people traveling the road ahead of him. He couldn't afford to lose them, the only hope he had.
Still, this arch seemed out of place. Time and salvation slipped away as he found himself drawn by a strange curiosity toward the opening into nothingness. The way back comes but once. He couldn't help but wonder what was on the other side. Curiosity was all he had going for him in this world, and it was going to lead him to trouble, he was sure, but he could not deny it. Heartbeat quickening, he stepped through the arch.
The Second Arch
The Tower was surprisingly dark after Low on a cloudless night. When Anahi woke suddenly from what must've been a nightmare, it took his eyes a moment to make out anything at all in the utter blackness. The darkness, perhaps, or a chill, was raising goose bumps up and down his arms. There was a glimmer of pale silver light coming from below his door, but even that was faint. Faint, but mysterious. As he watched, the light moved.
His feet swung over the side of the bed. Immediately, this set off alarms within his brain. He didn't want to be getting out of bed. It was likely that whoever was out in the hall was a guard or servant, but there was a distinct possibility it might be an Asha'man. If an Asha'man heard too much noise from inside the room, he might come in to investigate and be upset with Anahi for being out of bed in the middle of the night. Why then, was he standing up?
He tried to sit back down, but his body refused to follow the order. Instead, he slowly began moving toward the door. He could feel his body moving with more grace and poise than he was capable of, as though he were expecting an attack. His mind was already aware of an attack. He railed against the sense of helplessness, the sense of wrongness. [i]Turn around, burn you![/i] He was panicking. He had no idea what being might possess the light, and no idea why he was walking toward it against his will. This was a fear stronger than he'd ever felt, and he was certainly no stranger to fear.
The door opened to his hand. His mind was shutting down, unable to cope with the fear and apprehension. Waiting for him on the other side of the door was what appeared to be a young woman, dressed all in white. There was an orb of silver light suspended above her outstretched hand. Had he not known better, he might have thought her a Novice or Accepted. The lines and swirls on her face, so similar to his own, disallowed that possibility, however.
"You have done well," she said, in an accent he hadn't heard since leaving the trade city he'd escaped through. That had been so long ago, but not long enough, apparently. "We could not have asked for a better spy. It's a pity you'll never know how good you are at it. And such a cute specimen, as well." There almost seemed to be a sense of sadness in that statement. "If we'd known you would look like this, you'd have been a breeder." She reached up a hand to his forehead and he could feel her fingertips on his forehead. Slowly she began tracing the lines on his face.
No. No, this can't be happening. Get out of my head, Ayyad. Leave me be. If he'd had control of his functions, he'd have been crying. I just want to be left alone!
To his surprise, and obviously hers as well, that last thought came mumbled from his lips. Her eyes narrowed at him, but she seemed to be staring through him at something just behind his eyes. Was there a weave there only she could see, perhaps? "Strange. Perhaps these have been left alone too long. Time to readjust them."
No! he screamed mentally and mumbled again physically. Her eyes narrowed a bit more.
His sense of self was returning. The light-forsaken Ayyad were in his head, stealing his memories and using them to plan an attack against the Grey Tower, perhaps against the entire Westlands. Shuddering with the effort, his arm began to raise, but at his accord instead of hers. She seemed to stunned to respond. Her hand fell down from his face and she took a step back, looking at him in confusion.
"Get out of my head," he snarled slowly through heavy lips. He didn't know what they had done to him, but whatever it was seemed to be wearing off.
"No." She seemed to have found her backbone. Resolution settled on her face. "You are ours, marked at birth as one of us, and no matter how hard you try, boy, you will always be one of us. When this land is ours, you will be destroyed as are all men who can channel, as the Pattern demands. Settle yourself, tool, and-"
Her words were cut off as his hand clenched around her throat. There was little enough strength in his arms, but what strength he possessed was anchored on a solid foundation of hatred, fear, and anger. "Leave me be, burn you. I am no one's tool."
The way back will come but once. Be steadfast.
The words, floating from nowhere, caught him by surprise. The woman's face was a mask of terror, and slowly losing color, but he was too caught up in his emotions to even notice the fact that his goose bumps had faded or that the light in her hand had extinguished. His muscles did not loosen their death grip on her, but his head turned slowly to see the silvery outline of an arch two doors down the hall.
Kill her first, then explore. If she lived, she would find a way to report back to the Ayyad and the Pattern alone knew how long it would take them to get here. His eyes moved back to her face, tears streaming down her cheeks in the light from the arch. She was taking too long. The arch would not remain forever, he knew, though he didn't know how he knew and didn't think to question it. It was going to take him a while to get there, with his body resisting his every move as it was.
He couldn't leave her here, alive, but he was sure that arch was important. He lacked the strength to carry her along with him toward it. There was disaster if she lived, he was certain, and possible disaster if he didn't leave.
Groaning incomprehensibly, he threw her to the floor. Without a look back, he coerced his leaden arms and legs into motion.
The Third Arch
Already, he was getting tired of the explosions. These flaming, tattoo-faced goat-kissers were working harder than they needed to, Anahi was sure. They knew the Tower inside and out, as well as he did, and yet they attacked from the ground outside the compound. Surely they were regretting their choice to use a man. He knew weaves they had no access to, and if they'd tried to weave what he'd seen, it could only have gone badly for them.
Still, these were his people, and regardless of the fact that they were attacking his home, his friends, everything he knew and loved, he could not bring himself to destroy them as they needed to be destroyed.
Instead he fought his way across the courtyard. Soldiers led the attack in segmented bits of armor. The Ayyad flung fire and death from behind in a way that would've made the Seanchan cringe. Anahi would manage that somehow, but sword- and spear-wielding enemies were a more prevalent threat. He moved quickly and precisely through the battlefield, nameless Warders, soldiers, and channelers fighting beside him. His hands and feet struck only occasionally in the dance of death that reigned around him. There were more important combatants ahead that needed subduing. He was hardly the right person to be doing it, but he had a personal grudge against them. They were here because of him. Every death that happened this day was his fault, and so he had a duty to end it as quickly as possible.
Luckily he had social stigma on his side. The people of the Tower had rarely guessed at the meaning of his tattoos, but these soldiers, all too familiar with them, shied away whenever they noticed. On a woman they'd have marked a person worthy of respect. On a man, they were a warning that the person you were looking at was more dangerous than you could imagine. It didn't matter that he wouldn't have used the Power to rip through them as he knew he could. They knew he could, and didn't know he wouldn't.
There wasn't much to be done, then, on his way toward the Ayyad. Their prodigal son would return to them, a spy turned against its master, and they would regret having ever come here. He would make them regret, if he had to destroy each of them himself, schemers, power-mongers, and murderers all. Likely his people would be better without them, anyway.
Death began materializing around him. Flame and stone rained down from both directions and he was unsure for a moment who was trying to kill him. The body count was rising as tattooed faces came into view. An arm came from nowhere and caught him in the chest as he ran by.
Through the ringing in his ears and the sudden feel of breathlessness in his lungs, he heard a soft voice. "So the boy has returned to us in our hour of triumph." A head came into view. He recognized it in moments, even with the tattoos that were not there last he had seen it. "You have risen above yourself. Not only do you think yourself important enough for a name, but my name? Really, boy, you should be ashamed.
"Step aside, little girl," he muttered through teeth clenched in the rush of oxygen filling his lungs. "I don't want to hurt you."
As he stood, she laughed. "It is our time, boy. You don't have a choice."
The way back will come but once. Be steadfast.
Behind her stood a silver arch, alone and untouched on the battlefield. He settled into a guard stance. "If you insist, Anahi. Remember that I warned you."
Her hand motioned toward him and a wave of fire came with it. He'd expected something similar, knowing these women knew nothing but the Power, and even as she began to move, he was rolling below her wave, coming to his feet inches from her and using the momentum to flip her over his rising back. Now it was her turn to feel the wind knocked from her.
He was needed here. There would only be more death if he left. He knew it, and it ate him up inside. Without fear, however, he stepped into the archway.
