Fanfic:The Smile I Left Behind
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From that rampant sea of ice and fire that was Saidin, Lembirt painstakingly seperated out threads of Spirit and Air and Fire as fine as lace. He was among the best in the Tower, if not the best, at weaving Illusions, and yet even he found this particular subject difficult.
A plaintive meow caught his attention away from his work, and he looked down into the orange eyes of Ma'darath. No doubt the cat had picked up some of his anxiety, and was at ill ease as a result. "Not now, little monster," he said, speaking in the Old Tongue as he always did when addressing his pet. He reached down to briefly scratch the cat behind the ears, before returning to his work.
Were anyone present in the Master of Soldiers' Office, they would never have guessed that a thing was amiss. Order reigned supreme here, from the the neat stacks of paper on the desk, to the books arranged alphabetically on shelves, to the finely pressed and starched uniform of the Master himself. Yet, those stacks of papers would never move from "unfiled" to the cabinets beneath the massive desk, for Lembirt was leaving. He he needed to be gone by the first light of morning - in fact, he had already somewhat overstayed his welcome. Yet, he simply couldn't leave without finishing his work.
Earth was added to the Spirit-lace, carefully modulated to create shades as varied as those on a painter's palette. Threads of Water gave the deep, variable green the sheen of fine silk. The metals were more difficult - the gold sheen of the comb, for example, or the fine chain for the keseira, or the silver mountings of the moonstones in the necklace.
If he could only tell her how he felt, then this complicated subterfuge would not be necessary. He could not, though, for he had waited too long - and now perhaps that oppertunity was lost forever. He actions during the Seige - his deadful, foolish, unforgiveable actions - had led to an exile from the Tower. He could not now simply walk through the Indigo Halls to her apartments, for it was already past the time he was ordered gone by.
The hair was not the hardest thing, but it came close - groups of two or three strands each were woven from hair fine Spirit and Fire, and tinted red by even finer touches of Earth. Each was placed just so, so that the vibrant locks flowed smoothly and evenly around her shoulders, or were restrained in perfect order by the comb.
The hardest part, were the eyes. Here was not just a matter of matching colour and texture and brightness to that which he observed - no, within the eyes resided ones very soul. It was only after much careful consideration that he felt satisfied with his work, and Liana en'Damier's brilliant emerald eyes looked back at him.
The illusion was as perfect as he could make it - which was to say, it didn't nearly do justice to the Indigo Sitter. Her dress was fine green silk, a match to his own favourite Cairhienin coat, and the implication of his house colours adorning her clothing was clear - this was how he one day hoped to present her, to his family, as his Lady wife. Yet, he could not bring himself to overwhelm Liana Sedai's own sensibilities with his own devices - her hair, a shade of red no Cairhienin lady ever posessed without a trip o the Reader, was loose and flowing over her shoulders. The keseira, though a Cairhienin fashion, was graced with a ter'angreal moonstone crafted by her own Lady Grandmother. The moonstone necklace, from what he understood, also held some significance to her family line - though he was not certain of its exact purpose.
Beside the Liana Illusion stood the illusion he had crafted, long ago, of himself. His skill had greatly improved since then, and so the older portrait seemed almost crude by comparison. Yet, he made no move to alter it, for there was some validity to the comparison. He was but a pale, imcomplete shadow compared to Liana's splendor, after all.
He looked down once again at the cat, circling about his ankles with the fluidity of a fish beneath the sea. He dearly hoped that the one to first glimpse the Illusions would be Liana Sedai, and that he sought to show her what he could not simply say. If some other were the first to glimpse the Illusions, perhaps Serrah Sedai, his counterpart, or Aric Asha'man, the Head of his Ajah, then he hoped that at least they would think to summon her before the Illusion unravelled, or would understand that he had meant for her to watch over Ma'darath if nothing else.
He picked up the cat, scratched him fondly behind the ears, and then released him once more. "Goodbye, Little Monster," he said. Then, he left his study, locked the door, and disappeared.
