Fanfic:The Legacy

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The Legacy
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Svebere had forgone her usual tendancy of holding the governess' hand as she ascended the long spiraling staircase. Her fifth name-day had come and gone and it was time she began casting off her reliance on commoners.

Susima followed a pace behind, poised to catch the girl should she slip and tumble. Svebere raised herself one step at a time, from the lower Indigo Ajah Halls all the way up to the eleventh storey where the Sitters studied. She was not tall enough to reach the guiding rail that ran along the sides of the curved staircase, the same her father had once repaired when on the Council of Youth. But she did trail her hand along the inside stone wall for balance, her other fist lifting a pale green skirt in imitation of the way her lady mother climbed the stairs.

At last they reached the final landing and Svebere raced forth across the marble floor with all of the eagerness of a young child.

The floor here was of indigo-veined grey marble, accented with indigo ceramic tiles in the shape of the fang and flame. The faint marks of other colors would begin to appear and gradually grow more frequent the further in she ventured until they reached equal proportions in the center of the Inner Tower. Yet Svebere paused at one particular door. Above her head the symbol of the Choden Kal was set upon the door. She turned to look back at Susima expectantly.

As the governess approached, Svebere reached high for the door handle but found herself unable to touch it. Marks of frustration crossed her doll-like face, interrupting the smooth countenance that could only be found in a child of Cairhienin stock. Susima leaned forward and rapped her knuckles on the door. "Lembirt Asha'man," she said through the door, "your daughter is calling upon you." In truth, she only brought her here when appeasements and distractions proved fruitless.

When the door opened Svebere exclaimed, "Papa!" and stepped forward with her arms raised so that he might sweep her up into his arms. All in a rush of joyful giggles he picked her up and whirled her about in a great circle, her pale skirts ballooning out and her slippered feet kicking in glee.

"Again, Papa, again!" she demanded when he set her down, and so Lembirt picked her up and spun her once more before carrying her into the study and nestling her down into a plush armchair.

"And to what do I owe the pleasure of this visit, my dear Small Lady?" he asked, kneeling down so that his kindly smiling face was on a level with hers.

In all her five years, Svebere had never had never known the coldly scheming Lembirt, the dangerously mild Lembirt, or the slightly threatening Lembirt that had once haunted the Hall - that man was a stranger to her. She only knew her Papa, who was so very dashing in his high-collared black coats, who illustrated her bedtime stories with fanciful illusions and who let Svebere curl up on his lap while he and Mother and her other Lord Father conversed in the parlour long after Larrold and her sisters went off to their beds, the fragrant smell of pipe-smoke soothing her to sleep.

"I grew disenchanted with the nursery, Papa." Svebere said, with the extreme care of a child who has only recently added a new word to her vocabulary. "The other children are so very common, and they aren't clever enough for my games! I told Susima she must bring me to call upon you, Papa..." that was where her plot unraveled. "Pray, may I stay with you Papa? Do say yes!"

The Asha'man's smiling face stiffened a little, his dark eyebrows drawing closer together. "Dearling, I have a great deal of work-"

Svebere's face scrunched up into a scowl. Even her ringlets quivered. She would not be sent back to that dreadful boorish place! It was simply beneath her. She prepared herself for a scream...

...But found it unnecessary. Lembirt relented before he was even finished refusing. "Of course you may stay, Petal," he corrected himself. "But you must be very still and quiet. Can you do that for your Papa?"

Svebere didn't answer with words - she mimed lacing her lips closed, and then sat on her small hands and nodded firmly.

"That's my Small Lady," he praised her, ruffling her ringlet curls. He then dismissed the governess, closed the study door and returned to his desk. He was barely back in his seat when Svebere piped up:

"What are you working on, Papa?"

Lembirt did not scold her for breaking her promise to be silent.

"I am making sure that all is in readiness for the arrival of your sisters, brother, Lord Father and Lady Mother." Also there were arrangements under way for the matron of the family and her retinue, and he believed Lady Saphire Sedai would be arriving after her return with Aric Asha'man to the Blightborder. Yet preparations for the children's grandmother and great-grandmother were not entirely his to make.

A few more quiet moments passed, underscored by the rustling of papers and the scratch of pen nib. "And Uncle Aetha too Papa?"

"Yes, of course." Lembirt did not look up from his work. The grim, hulking Aielman who warded her father was, for reasons unexplained, one of Svebere's very favourite people. She either did not know, or quite possibly did not care, about his common foreigner blood.

A few more moments of quietude passed. Svebere kicked her feet beneath her skirts, then squirmed about in the chair. Finally, she grew weary of that and slid out of the armchair to roam about the study. Her father kept a watchful eye on her over his documents. Svebere had not yet developed a healthy respect for parchment.

The office was stacked with crates and coffers, labelled in the neat hand she recognized as her Lady Mother's - though of course she could not decipher the arcane squiggles. There were simply bound books that she knew were study journals, and many of the impossibly queer objects that she knew were called ter'angreal. She trailed her fingers over the books and boxes, but her curious digits did not stray too near the ter'angreal. That was a most severe boundary that her mother and both her fathers enforced - even her usually indulgent Papa.

She circled the room, searching but finding nothing of interest, not even implements to inflict her artistic talent on available surfaces. Soon enough she was standing beside her father's chair, the top of her bow visible just above the desktop. She gripped the arm of the chair for balance and stretched up onto her tip-toes, straining to see what occupied her father's attention. It must be terribly important if it diverted him away from her.

"Why must we live here?" she suddenly asked.

Lembirt put aside his quill, sanded the page, and shifted his chair so that he faced his little girl. He patted his lap. "Come here," he said, and she eagerly complied. She nestled her be-ribboned head against his the soft silk of his coat. Gently she pinched the smooth fabric to feel it slide between her fingers. The child gazed up at her father with large dark green eyes.

"There are several reasons that our family is returning to the Grey Tower," he replied, thoughtfully and with great patience. "Your elder sister, Ellisande, is of the age to don Novice Whites, for one." Svebere nodded, envious of her sister. She could not wait until she too would sign the Novice Book, though it seemed impossibly far in the future.

"Your Lady Mother and I also wished to resume our studies, and your Lord Father Caithlan wished to further his martial skills in a way that was not possible at our estates." He tousled her ringlet curls, mussing the careful arrangement Liana had made of them. There was another reason for their return, but it was not one that he would explain to her for fear that it would be too troubling to the child. Svebere had slept through the incident with the Dragonsworn, unaware of the tension on the estate and unperceptive of her sisters' worried countenances the next morning...


Yesterday. At the en'Damier estates in the country beside Whitebridge

The breeze brought strange rowdy voices and tumbled the sheets about Ellisande, leaving her partially exposed to the cool night air. She could make out some of the phrases and they sounded like the Prophet's people - the Dragonsworn she witnessed during her stay with her foster family, Lady and Lord Talvaen in Ghealdan. It was only a dream, she told herself, and shrugged the sheets back on. But the voices captured her attention even with eyes closed to them. They warred with her desire to sleep and she shifted restlessly. Fortunately, her indecision was relieved by her sister's touch on her back.

"Are you asleep?" Avaritia asked. "Yes, are you?" Ellisande turned and tapped her sister's nose playfully. It seemed there would be no sleep until curiosity was quenched. Woolsey rose from his place at the girls' feet and loped after them as the sisters crossed the room and knelt in their white shifts upon the window seat.

Below the dormer window, the formal gardens of the en'Damier estates stretched out into the star spangled darkness. The nursery window looked out over flower beds, hedges, and a reflecting pond, and further in the distance the lane that curved down a gentle hill to meet with the main road. At this late hour, all should have been still and quiet, save for the chirping of frogs and the lonely calls of night birds.

That was not the case tonight, however. The light of the silvery moon revealed the men in the road, a large and disorganized group, fragmenting now and again into smaller clusters and then reforming into a loose mob. Someone had built a bonfire in the middle of the road, and snatches of combative songs drifted up to the little girls' window.

The house retainers were there as well, Ellisande knew, for she could see the moonlight glinting off their armour as they stood at watchful attention at the foot of the lane. Their captain was a huge dark shadow atop his big cavalry charger.

Avaritia took a breath to speak, but Ellisande held a forefinger to her lips and breathed, "Hush. Don't wake the little ones." Their younger brother and sister, twins, were only five years old and too small to yet be included in their nocturnal adventures. She pattered toward the doorway.

Voices drifted in from the narrow crack under the door. A ribbon of orange light in the blue-grey room. The girls made a break for it but the lanky Murandean Shepherd pup loped ahead to cut them off. Wherever Avaritia went, Woolsey was there first, tail wagging. He knew they ought to be abed and barked a gentle warning.

The pup furrowed his brow in an attempt at sternness, which as a war hound, he ought to portray. It failed comically when Avaritia reached out both hands to scratch behind his pointed ears. Woolsey let out the barest whine of indecision, then dropped his head to the side, his long pink tongue lolling out from his mouth.

Their governess, Susima, was asleep in her cups. They all ought to have been abed at this hour, but Ellisande had seen thirteen name days, and was even due to take the novice white at the Grey Tower. She was all but a woman grown and flowered, and far too old for a governess - Susima was mostly there for the little ones' sake, anyway.

She nudged the door open and peeked through the crack. Avaritia poked her head under her sister's.

"There's a guard at the stairs." her sister whispered a little too loudly.

"That only happens when Great Gran-mama is worried." Ellisande agreed. "Follow me."

Guards were often a feature at the estates, but rarely were they stationed so close to the living quarters of the family. They were normally only seen around the entrances and patrolling the grounds, and the children had come to regard them as much as any other decoration. Like the vases of sea folk porcelain that rested on narrow plinths in the downstairs receiving room; they were not very entertaining and should not be approached too closely.

Though the retainers employed by House en'Damier were sturdy men and true, they stood to protect the family from outsiders, not to keep little girls in their nursery. Bare feet padded across the carpet, dodging the creaks in the wooden floor, and side-stepping the watchful eyes. They knew every crick and every crack, every opening and every blind spot, every corridor and secret hiding place. And so it was no great hardship to evade the guards. Their tip-toes ended behind a heavy curtain.

They hid in a window-niche behind heavy drapes that were closed for the evening. The elder sister peered through a gap between the two velvet edges, holding them just wide enough to see through. Her shorter sister knelt on the plush Domani rug and peeped out at about knee level. From the curtained niche, the girls could view the stairs, past another armed retainer, and into the foyer. The angle was rather awkward - they could see both of their Lord Fathers, a much taller man who had his black coated back turned to them, but not who the three men were speaking to. The voices were intimately familiar, however. Ellisande cupped her hand over her little sister's mouth to stop her giggling and they listened to their elders discuss urgent and important things...

"--Little birds that ought be safely roosting are a-flutter in the rafters." That was the deceptively casual tone of their great gran-mama, the High Seat.

A moment of meaningful silence passed - entirely lost on the girls. Then, their Da, Caithlan, spoke. "Dragonsworn in Whitebridge - we did not need this. And with the Winged Silver Sword leading his sun-blinded army north up towards us as well."

"Burn and bloody them all. We could put paid to this rabble without breaking a sweat." That was Nana, and she sounded tired.

"Nana's back!" Avaritia whispered excitedly. Of all the children, Avi was the most like the Green Sister. Only Saphire Sedai seemed to understand how the strictures of a noble upbringing chafed her. And it was she who had gifted Woolsey to Avaritia.

"If we mean to sortie, we would be wise to send off our doves to a safer cote," said their Lord Father, Lembirt. "I cannot think of who I would trust with the task, though, that would not also be integral to the-"

Their Da interrupted. "This is hardly the last stand of the Seven Towers, Lembirt." He had that dry flavour to his tone that they only heard when he was speaking with Father. It was not unexpected; their fathers often disagreed. Mama continued. "Captain Owin reports that the guardsmen have the situation in hand."

"My small folk are among those assembled," the family matriarch concluded. "They are frightened and swept up in the fervor of the mob, but they will not rise against us." The lady Amora stepped into view and paused, as if deciding whether to reveal something of grave import, and in what measure...

No-one disputed that - not that any of their family would speak against the High Seat. "They are well in hand now, yes," Father said. "And no real harm has come about. But will the same be true next time? And if this happened during the day, while our sparrows chirped and hopped about in the gardens?" There was never much expression in their Lord Father's voice and manner, but there was tension in it now. His neatly curled moustache nearly quivered.

As though summoned by his Ward's worries, Aetha then ghosted through the doors. He gave a brief bow to those gathered, and then took up position in the periphery of the room with Amora's Right and Left. The girls knew from experience that the Aielman would likely have little to add to the conversation. Ellisande found his foreign chivalry and his broad, blunt features charming, though his silences unnerved her. Avaritia said the man shivered her skin.

Her attention shifted to the next speaker. "Perhaps there is some merit to Lembirt's implication," said the tall black-coated man, reluctantly. As soon as he spoke the girls recognised their Uncle Aric's Kandori accent. Aric Cosamaru Asha'man had always been a fixture in the children's lives. Though in truth not their uncle by blood - he was an Ajah brother to their parents and the distinction between them was not immediately clear to the young ones. "I checked once, twice, and thrice - the safety measures are as secure as the day you had me install them. But the little birds cannot be kept in the roost indefinitely. They did not fly far from the nest in that regard." At that he issued what sounded to be a cross between a snort and a laugh.

At last lady Amora spoke, and all grew silent. "This is no longer a place for children. Nor is it ours. We will no longer be welcome when the Children of the Light arrive. With Telam the Younger's death, the duchy will fall to my grandson, Jaisen the Younger, and he will rule through Lleyni - the heir after Saphire's line. Jaisen never forgave me, or Saphire, for becoming Aes Sedai; let alone for his father, Kadar's, death-

Nana interrupted, "Burn him for a Light-blinded she-goat, he thought I murdered my own brother!"

Great-grandmother Amora raised a subtle hand, "Hush my daughter. Let me be clear: when the Children of the Light arrive, the Dragonsworn and my people will paint the White Bridge red." she looked to someone Ellisande could not see, "The avalanche has begun. It is too late for the snowflakes to vote."

For the first time, she saw Lady Amora as more than her great-grandmother. She recognized the High Seat and her parents' dowager Amyrlin Seat standing in Gran-mama's place, for she had allowed the grown-ups to come to the same conclusion she had - though the adults had taken a different path. She'd simply wanted them think out the problem for themselves, just as she was wont to do with Ellisande and her siblings at lessons.

That made her wonder...had lady Amora seen their future in a Dream? Did the 'avalanche' move 'snowflakes' like the Wheel wove threads? If so, then the thought brought no comfort - it felt far too foreboding and inevitable. And if that were so, what would become of her cousins? What would become of them...?

Ellisande decided to think on that later; her mother now spoke with strained voice, "I would keep the flock close, and nested together."

"But to where would we move them?" uncle Aric mused.

"Not Ghealdan," Da said immediately. "Not after-"

"There was never any proof of that," said Mother.

"I rather think there was," said Father, but without any real feeling, as though this were an old argument.

What father did next drew quickly stifled gasps of wonder from the two hidden observers. The guard looked over his shoulder, but Avaritia and Ellisande went as still and silent as statues, and he turned back to his assigned vigil. Perhaps he thought the noise was only Woolsey, who was stationed in front of the drape,. letting out a canine snorkel in his sleep.

Lembirt Asha'man made a broad, sweeping wave with his hand and brought to life a huge map of the whole of the Westlands, floating in the middle of the foyer. It appeared first as a wire framework outlining the contours of the mountains and lowlands of the continent, then was splashed with monochrome lights and shadows, and finally filled in with colour and bristling forest shapes. Blocks of neat text appeared, labelling the various nations in his own precise hand. Here and there were little flourishes, all of them suggesting the emotional state of the artist. In the Aryth Ocean, huge tentacled monsters and sea serpents writhed, while out-of-scale raken flew above the Seanchan controlled lands. Dragonmount was erupting a gout of flame from its summit, and storms raged above the eponymous southern sea.

"Not west of the Mountains of Mist," said Uncle Aric, "And the Bees as well have fallen under the Crystal Throne." Those nations - Arad Domon, Tarabon, Amadicia, Altara, Illian - all were glazed with red tint, lines crossed through them like dagger slashes, much like Ghealdan - stricken from the map.

"Tear will be of no aid to Aes Sedai, Murandy is far too chaotic and lacks a strong ruler, and Mayene too small to weather what will come." Mama said thoughtfully. There was a rustling sound, as of a lady's gown as she turned on her heel. "What of the borderlands, Mother?"

There Nana swore, and rather colorfully. No-one had ever been able to get Saphire Sedai to cease her wharf-talk, and likely no-one ever would. Avaritia had to bite her tongue to keep back a giggle, and Ellisande knew she had filed away the oath for future use. Nana actually sounded defeated. "There were too few of us. I'm sorry Aric." She walked forward into their field of view, then, and put a hand on Aric's shoulder. She didn't only sound tired, but looked it too, and more than the late hour could account for. She was dressed in divided skirts, dusty from the road and ripped, with darker stains besides. Her black hair was uncombed, and dark marks circled under her eyes. Worse, Ellisande saw the blood speckled across her face - whose blood she did not know, and did not care to.

Someone gestured for a servant to bring Uncle Aric a chair, but he remained standing for the moment. "Blood and ashes, we did everything we could for them, saved as many as we could..." she struggled for the words, "Good brave men died all around us, or worse - were eaten alive by trollocs and draghkar - all to buy a little time." Saphire's words would give Ellisande nightmares for weeks, though the real horror of the take was lost on younger Avaritia. "Aric - listen to me - Kandor is burning. The Light has forsaken the Red Steed, and I suspect Arafel too. They belong to the Dark One and His Blight now. Burn my eyes, but I saw it. Tarmon Gaidon has claimed its first casualties."

It wasn't just the children who were frightened - Lembirt slashed through Arafel and Kandor on the map, and the sickly blue-brown stain of the blight crept south. Little rampaging trolloc and nightman figures appeared, and fires raged. He made a sharp gesture with one hand and the shadowspawn dissolved. The fires remained, though.

Though Aric had remained standing during their Nana's retelling, their father's illustration appeared too much for him. His hulking frame dropped into the chair with a great resounding thump. "I...feared as much." His usual jovial voice wavered a moment, but then firmed. "When my agent from the Guardian City reported the departure of the Borderland armies, I'd hoped they were returning to defend their homelands, but they've followed Him instead. I sure hope He knows what He's doing." The Indigo looked up at the Green. "Thank you Saphire, I know you made the Shadow pay for every inch of land they have corrupted."

A respectful pause was observed before anyone spoke again. "Kandor and Arafel are fallen, and we cannot know the status of Sheinar and Saldaea for certain either." Question marks appeared.

"Andor has only just regained her Lion," Lady Amora said. "And Tar Valon its Flame after the Crystal Throne struck it - their exotics reach far."

"And the less said of the Black Tower and its Fang, the better," said Caithlan. An ominous obsidian spire sprouted and loomed close to Caemlyn. He murmured something further that the girls could not hear, his dark head bowed close to Father's in council. Armies, represented by mounted figures holding aloft their respective banners, appeared on the map. Dotted trails indicated their paths.

"The Threefold Land is no place for Wetlander Children," Aetha said quietly, without turning away from the window where he kept a watchful eye on the guardsmen in the lane.

There was more discussion, and more names were struck through. The Waste was discussed and discarded, and Cairhien held little advantage over Whitebridge. It was Aric who eventually raised the point that had been obvious but unspoken from the start. "As strange as it may sound, the middle of this mess might be the safest place right now." He pushed himself up from the chair, and strode forward to view the Illusionary map. "I am no strategist, but I feel being being surrounded on all sides, yet having allies, is preferable to trying to make our own way deep in hostile or unknown territory."

The Prophet's Dragonsworn, the Shaido Aiel, and Goldeneyes' armies were all close, and the Seanchan not so far off either. Yet, the Grey Tower was the obvious answer.

"Agreed." Lady Amora intoned.

"Well then, it is decided." Father waved a hand and the Mountains of Mist and immediate surrounds expanded to fill the space that had been occupied by the entire continent a moment before. It was strange to see their Lord Father to gesture so much, for he rarely moved his hands while Channelling. He had once told Ellisande that sort of thing was for commoners, though Mother had explained it differently. "Shall we Travel, then?" The field of view tightened further, until the forms of the Grey Tower and Hama Valon rose up in sharp relief.

Nana harrumphed. "Be still, Lembirt. What have I told you about jumping like a buck rabbit?"

"Mother please." Liana sighed, and turned to soothe their worried father, her lord husband. She spoke softly and grasped his hand in her own, "Go on ahead, my dear. Pray, take the youngest and make the way unobscured for us." a brief pause, "We shan't tarry long," she addressed Saphire Sedai again, "and then we shall warn our Brothers and Sisters that the Last Battle draws nigh."

Nana grumbled. "Little and less will come of it." it pained Ellisande to hear her so sound so defeated, "Blood and ashes! Most of the white-livered sons of goats would rather stroll in the Gardens than glance outside the Battlements! The Tower has pulled the flaming wool taut over its eyes and can't even smell the hair burning!"

"Then we'll yank the wool off their eyes." Liana and Caithlan said at once, the bond showing its true form. Ellisande hoped they smiled.

Great Gran-mama's voice was like chimes in the wind. Ellisande's eyes widened as she realized that she was perceived. Though the girl could not see the dowager Amyrlin from her hiding place, she felt those emerald eyes pierce her concealment, focused on her as though they would capture her very soul.

"...and now it's past time for our little birds to fly back to their nest." the Lady Amora Sedai pronounced. Her lips curved in a faint smile as bare feet scurried to the safety of their nursery.

Heavy feet drummed the criss-cross path back to safety. Ellisande felt like she'd grown a half-hand taller when she slipped back into bed. She grasped more than her little sister could hope to understand, and it frightened her. So too did the fact that those older and wiser than she were scared. They don't know what to do. She came to understand. They are only buying time, for us, their legacy.

"Do you think we will see a real battle, Elli?" No, Avaritia did not understand what they had just witnessed, not like Ellisande did. Her younger sister sounded excited at the prospect. "Perhaps, but I dare say we won't like the sight..." Across the nursery, there came a rustle and a murmur as the comment roused Larrold from his sleep.

"Hush sweet Larry, it's not yet morning. Go chase your dreams, little man." Ellisande's dream had been to become an Aes Sedai. She wondered if this is what it felt to be a grown-up, and if there was still time for her to become one...


Today. In the Grey Tower.

Svebere did not fathom what concerned the grown-ups so, but as she watched her thoughtful Papa worrying loudly, she decided that whatever conclusion he came to with her Lady Mother and Lord Father Caithlan, he would not permit any harm to come to her. She would just have to learn to play with the small folk and endure the rest. So long as they were not to be parted, she could make herself content.