Fanfic:Resuming Duty
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Crossing a sluggish mountain stream, Caden Ives squinted with his good eye at the autumn sun.
With so many years between him and the place he had called home rendered into mere hours remaining, he could not help but feel a certain sense of nostalgia. He could not remember the number of years it had been, but he knew they were sufficient for him to have gained a life beyond the Mountains of Mist. Or rather; he had reclaimed his birthright, and whether that was the meaning of the painful life the Light had provided him, he could not say. The lordship of the House of Ives was not a grand title, but it had standing in Arafel ??? the country he had discovered to be his true origin. The meaning of doing so was not superficial and done in want for power ??? rather, it was a way for him to settle his past. In order to overcome his shadowsworn father, he had retaken what the nobles in the province had taken away. Caden did not blame them since his father had left only blood and ashes in his wake when departing, but it was nevertheless a lineage that had stretched over centuries, and he did not care to be the broken link.
But now, when he saw the mountains around him again, he remembered. Oh, he remembered.
He had spent too many years there in ignorance of what was rightfully his. In the end, only his sword had been his trustworthy companion. He had sought respite in the fact that he was to die in battle with the Shadow, accepted it and welcomed its eventual reality. He had even settled in the Citadel to spend his last few years dancing with death at the border of the Blight. But death did not come for him then, and it had not claimed him yet.
The years after he left the Tower and became Lord of the House of Ives had been numerous and not without close calls to death's gates ??? but now he returned with the woman he meant to warder against shadow until he drew his last breath. Leaving his old liegeman Niga as steward of his province, Caden returned together with Captain General Miahala Sha'hal ??? Head of the Green Ajah. Without other duties to fulfil, he could now sacrifice his life for her cause. I am not dead. Not yet. But she might have to bear witness to another Warder dying for her.
She rode at his side, handling her horse without effort in the mountainous terrain they rode through. Caden looked over at her with his good eye ??? an odd feeling of... peacefulness settling in his mind. The right side of his face was covered in a white silken mask with black avendesora patterns, but a faint smile hinted at his unburned lips. His green eye soon returned to the road ahead, and just then, they passed the last ridge.
The Grey Tower loomed ahead in the afternoon sun, hazed by the low clouds of the high altitude. There's naught else for me now. I can't care less if they still remember me as the monster of the Yards. And the Black Ajah would await him there, as always, elusive and deadly. While he was gone, the ones he had killed would have been replaced by others. I have nowhere else to be, and the Shadow shall know my presence and regret the day the Dark One crawled out of his hole. Spurring Winterbourne into a fast trot, Lord Caden Ives led their way down the last mountain pass, his pale yellow hair streaming in the wind.
The Warder in exile had returned.
