Fanfic:Things Foretold/Chapter III
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When arriving at the manor, they were greeted by Catvinya's butler, a dispassionate old man with silky, straight, bone-white hair that fell down his back like a waterfall. He waved to the tall guards in livery and polished helmets to let them through to the double gates, which were wide open to admit the slow trickle of arriving guests.
"Welcome, Lady Miahala Sedai," he said in a low resonance of humility, "It is always a welcome sight to see you as a guest at my Lady's manor. Come, come! Who is your escort? I believe I have not made his acquaintance."
"Lord Caden of the House of Ives," answered Caden without pause, inclining his head respectfully to the man, "Lady Miahala's Gaidin of yore and present-day."
The old man's quick eyes noted, and deciphered, the Arafellin badge on his chest, the mask on his scarred features and the heron on his sabre. "A pleasure, my Lord. I hear your estates prosper after your ascendance to the High Seat. My name is Siu Laugan. Please enter and await my presence in the lobby. You will be announced shortly before entering the Grand Hall."
After being let inside, they found themselves in a lobby with high white-marble pillars that led to a painted ceiling. There was no staircase, but several doors aligned the eastern and western walls. Only one pair of double doors could be seen opposite the entrance, closed and guarded by two men in the same livery as the ones outside. Other guests waited inside the lobby, nobles in full attire and attended by squires and attendants. Upon entering, Miahala and Caden were met by curious glances and poorly hidden scrutiny.
Aye, Caden thought, staring back with his unblinking green eye till they looked way, each in turn, 'who are these foreigners?' you ask yourselves. 'What role do they play here at this banquet? Are they envoys? Are they alone? Where is their escort? What affiliation do they have to Lady Catvinya? Who are their allies? What wealth do they possess? Can they be used? Can they be bought?' Shaking his head, he turned his eye to Miahala, giving her a faint smile with the corner of his mouth. "The nations change, the game is played the same. One does grow weary with it after a while."
Minutes passed, and slowly, some of the nobles began to approach them for conversation, like vultures descending on ripe carcasses. However, they were saved as the man named Siu got to them before that happened.
"Lady Miahala, Lord Caden," he said, "please follow me."
The nobles in the lobby grew restless and flustered with incredulity, inquisitiveness or indignation - realizing that these newcomers had been admitted to the banquet even though they had arrived after all the others already present. If they had wondered who they were before, they were desperate to know then.
Their curiosity was settled as the doors opened to the Grand Hall the herald raised his booming voice, already informed of their identities by Siu. "Please welcome Lady Miahala Sha'hal Machera Jolstraer, Aes Sedai of the Grey Tower, Captain General of the Green Ajah. Also welcome her escort, Lord Caden Ives, the Sword of the Ivy Cross, Blademaster and High Seat of the House Ives in Arafel, Gaidin of the Grey Tower and to Lady Miahala!"
Inside, three long tables were set, aligned with high-backed chairs with red leather. The guests stood in groups inside the Grand Hall, mingling underneath the light of three immense chandeliers. At the end of the hall, twin staircases led up to a terrace with marble railing, with guards posted along it to overlook the activities below. Between the first steps of the staircases, an upraised stage was set, holding flower arrangements that defied gravity with the help of steel wires. The ceremony was most likely to be held there.
The guests were looking at the newcomers like the ones in the lobby had; and even though they had been informed of their identities, Miahala and Caden had left the cinders and entered the flame. There was nowhere to hide or slip away, so there was no reason to try. With his head held high, Caden gave Miahala his arm and led her inside the hall to meet the onslaught.
They were, however, saved by the attention of Lady Catvinya, who came practically running towards them before anyone else got close.
"Here we go," Mia said softly, watching as the Lady Catvinya moved her way through the small groups and directly towards Caden and Miahala. Even with those waiting to be announced in the foyer, there were still a fair few people in this room already and most were trailing Catvinya and wondering over the people she rushed to meet. Some had already met Mia on previous visits and even though it was a long time ago, they recalled her, though they did wonder who this lord with her was.
Catvinya was bustling in her usual way. "Oh, I'm so glad that you could make it and this dress, it's lovely, and it's so like you. Green! My, my, do you ever wear anything else? Oh, of course you don't, of course you don't. You've been very mean, though, and not telling me that your new Warder is a lord of an Arafellin house! How cruel you are to keep me in the dark." Her words didn't stop, but she now turned her full body and firm gaze on to Caden.
"Lord Ives, it is wonderful that you are here and wonderful that you are with my dear Miahala. I know that she takes terrible risks in her life, even though she won't admit as much around me, but I hear things, never doubt that, and Mia has been a good friend. I would hate to hear that she had taken to too much harm, and I worried so over that in the years that she was on her own. Oh! I know that she can take care of herself, I've heard it many times, but still I worried and have that worry abated by your presence."
Catvinya turned around and seemed to be looking for something. Mia was about to say something, but the woman had already disappeared, hurrying off. Mia turned back to Caden and a smile flashed in her eyes, although outwardly she was precisely the Aes Sedai that she had been announced as. She was Miahala Sha'hal Machera Jolstraer Aes Sedai, Captain General of the Green Ajah. She was over a century old. She had power that dwarfed what these nobles considered power in scope and ability.
They all knew it, too, and that was why they cast glances over varying natures in her direction. Those who knew her were neutral or even warm, because they had met her and spoken with her - and remained on her good side during that time. Those that did not know her looked at her and wondered whether she would be detriment or asset. They looked at Caden the same way, although none of them knew him and they saw him as a threat to their own concept of power, for he was a noble. They could understand that easier than the threads that Mia wove. It was easier to grasp.
Miahala's face was without expression and with little color. She was a still creature, a statue, in the middle of a swirling mass of people and speculation. Her back was straight and her head was held high. She was the image of an Aes Sedai.
Yet, in spite of all of this, when her eyes met Caden's, she was only Miahala and only for him.
Again, Mia began to open her mouth to say something Caden and again she was interrupted by the Lady Catvinya. It was like each time Mia opened her mouth, or began to, Catvinya's voice came out. A faint smile passed over Miahala's lips as she turned tolerantly towards the noblewoman, who was easily several inches shorter than Mia, but her presence made up for the difference. "Oh good, you two didn't run away," she said with a warm, teasing smile. Behind them, other nobles were announced and they received the perfunctory glance, but Catvinya's words never slowed.
"Before all of the fuss starts and I am not able to do this properly, I wanted you to meet my lovely daughter." She reached behind her and pulled forward a girl. The younger Masseroy looked to be about sixteen or seventeen. (It made Miahala suddenly weary to think that she had great, great grandchildren that were probably around this girl's age.) She was a quieter version of her mother. They were the same in height and build, though the younger was thinner. All the noble and celebratory accoutrement that she was dressed in seemed to over-whelm her thin frame and her shy aura.
The girl turned large pale-colored eyes up to Mia and Caden. Her gaze flickered to them both and she gave a small bow of her head to each, along with a tentative smile. "This is my lovely daughter Alassia and this is her engagement we're here for," Catvinya went on, even though everyone in that group already knew that. Alassia gave her mother a faint smile and said something so quiet that Mia couldn't here. Catvinya nodded and the girl gave one more look and nod before heading off again.
"She's very shy," Catvinya said, although that was fairly obvious. Rising to her toes, Catvinya looked behind her and pointed. "That boy up near the main table is the one she is to be engaged to. He is almost as shy as she is, but a lovely boy and a good family name." She turned back to them. "Well, I can't talk any more as there are more people I must speak with before things begin, but we'll be sitting down soon and I can see you again during the dinner. Enjoy yourselves in the meantime."
Once again, Mia watched her just seemingly vanish in a flurry of words. The Aes Sedai sighed and turned to her Warder. "It's going to be a long night," she said softly, a faint smile ghosting over her face before it disappeared again behind the ivory façade.
At indication, Caden turned his head to apprise the second person that this event was dedicated to, and locked eyes with the young man that was to be betrothed to the Masseroy daughter.
Awkward as he was in his silver-embroidered black coat, he would have made an implosive young man if he had just stood straight and not looked as if he was to run away at any given notice of danger. When Caden's single green eye, paired with the white orb that was partly shadowed by the eye-hole of his mask, touched his, the youth raked back his ashen hair and blinked to cover his clear bistre irises. His hand shook as he lifted it from the table he had been leaning on, and walked away. Love-angst? Caden reflected, Or merely a doe-eyed hare in the husk of a man?
"It's going to be a long night," Miahala said softly by his side, and Caden turned to face her in time to see her hinted smile.
"Indeed," he rasped and let out a long hissing breath, "So let us get the pleasantries done with. We would be poor visitants to Lady Catvinya if we did not converse with her other guests. Its to be expected of us."
Hence, they made their due as guests at the manor, making conversation with people of different lineage and agendas. They learned that the young man that was going to wed young Lady Alassia was young Lord Tarili of House Orryn. They also learned that it was a joining that was frowned upon since it would make the two Houses wealthier and more influential than any other in the region. Many had tried to stop it, through slander, lies, threats and annulled trading contracts. But they also learned that the betrothal had not been intended by House Masseroy or House Orryn, because of the expected repercussions against their reputation. Rather, it had been a love-affair between the two young ones that had finally made the parents act, who, before any other factors, saw it as their responsibility to have the betrothal made for the sake of the children and the love the two shared.
It was an engagement of love, not of contrivance. Moreover, Houses Masseroy and Orryn were defiant in their resolve to have the two children wed, because they loved them. And this night was another blow that would nail the coffin shut.
When all guests had arrived, Lady Masseroy stepped up on the stage between the staircases together with a wiry, hard man in an intricately gold-embroidered coat. Miahala and Caden had already learned that the man was Lord Jhevan Orryn, the fiancé-to-be's father. The Grand Hall fell silent.
"Thank you all for coming this day," said Lord Orryn with a resonance that belied his narrow frame. His grey hair had climbed back from his forehead, but without leaving him a shadow of his former self. He had probably aged well, and the years and lines in his face affirmed his presence in the hall. His countenance brook no disputation. "We would ask you to be seated before the engagement ceremony begins."
When Lady Masseroy spoke, it was a chime of bells in the wake of the stark man's semi-request. "Yes, yes, please make yourselves comfortable. Oh, I'm so glad to see all these faces again. We hope you all will enjoy this night of celebration. Siu! Will you please give word that we are about to begin?"
The Masseroy butler stood on the other side of the hall. I will wager that this man is more than he seems, thought Caden, It would surprise me if this Siu Laugan is not the Lady Masseroy's unofficial spy-master. The butler merely bowed across the hall and slipped away without a word, while the guests stirred to find their seats by the tables.
Adjusting his sabre, Caden seated himself by the table of honor, next to an overly-powdered noblewoman in a burlesque dress. Miahala's seat was across from his own, and by the end of their table loomed the wide stage with the flower arrangements.
The hall held its breath in near silence, awaiting the ceremony to begin.
Miahala didn't like mingling at these events. She only realized the necessity out of being polite and it was getting under her skin that Caden was pressing so much on what was expected based on nobility. Mia was not expected to do anything here because she was not a noble, nor was she a member of their game unless she chose to be.
She disliked the appearance of ego, but sometimes, she realized she had the right for it and that she had earned it. She could stand above all of these people and not speak to any of them if she chose not to. Miahala was not one of them and it was beginning to irritate her that Caden was putting her in that category. She realized that was a noble and she respected that, but she wasn't. She was Aes Sedai to her blood, and she was a Saldaean farmgirl.
In all honesty, it was not that she held anything against Caden, of course not, but she didn't like being forced in to a role that was not her and that she did not have to take. Only the crowd was dictating that she play this part, and that frustrated her. She was forced to hide herself in a facade, but she kept all of those thoughts to herself and buried them far enough down to not be a blazing fire.
Plus, it was neither here nor there. She was not going to dig her fancy-shoe clad feet in to the ground and pitch a fit. She was not a child, so she kept herself silent and her emotions held back and went through the process. It at least had gathered some information, so it was not all that bad.
Once the announcement had been made, everyone moved to their assigned tables and sat down. It was something of a relief, since they seemed to have been put near people who had no interest to speak to (or even look at) an Aes Sedai or her warder, and in all honesty, that did not bother Miahala in the least. Besides, the Ceremony was beginning and everyone's attention was turned towards it.
Mia watched and felt a metamorphosis of her feelings. It had started out with annoyance over the forced mingling, but it softened and blended in to something else entirely as she watched the two young people. It reminded her of her wedding with Ryne, back when she was young. She was no longer young, but that didn't mean she didn't have feelings about these things - that was proven. This moment just reminded her of the conversation with Caden on the way in, and the thoughts began moving through her again.
A very faint, practically imperceptible smile curved the corners of her lips and the light in her eyes.
It was about at this time that the wheels came off the wagon.
There was a short-lived shouting match from outside of the room, warning calls, and the clattering of weapons - either against each other or against the floors. It was hard to tell from in here. The guards inside were automatically at stiffer attention than they had been before. Some moved to close in around the people on the dais and others moved to go out and see what was happening.
The room was filled with sudden, choking tension as a horde of nobles all were startled and then scared. Some were out of their seats, moving away from the source of the noise.
Miahala, meanwhile, was on her feet as well. She had the One Power embraced before she even realized what she was doing, but it didn't matter. Whether it was a conscious or subconscious thought, it was what she would have done. She also reached for her daggers, only to realize that she didn't have them... although she did have the other, but that would wait.
It all happened quickly.
There was more noise outside, over-whelmed and put down, from where the guards had run out. In moments, the very large group of insurgents moved in to the ball room.
Before really understanding what awaited them beyond the closed doors to the Grand Hall, Caden was on his feet, attentive. What...?
When the double doors were thrown open, the insurgents streamed in a steady flow towards the three long tables of seated nobles. They were dressed in white from sandaled feet to the cowls that hid their faces. Their cloaks hid amour and identities alike, but their curved swords were bare to the light of the chandeliers. With a mute and steadfast aim towards the stage with the two young to-be-betrothed, they brook no doubt about that they were gong to cut their way to them.
Then, while most of the nobles remained seated in consternation, the guards on the terraces along the Grand Hall discharged their crossbows.
In an immediate rain of steel-tipped bolts, the main body of the insurgents fell to the mosaic floor like skewered pigs, squealing and writhing in agony. White cloaks turned red, and the bright sprays of blood was smeared out by flailing limbs. It was not a sight one forgot, how so many lives were snuffed out in unstaunched, instantaneous carnage, be the victims assassins or not. Not only they, but the pampered Ladies and Lords also screamed in horror and turned high-backed chairs over in desperation to flee the carnage, for more assassins in white trickled through the doors.
It happened too fast. In moments, the whole scene was chaos and Death.
The crossbowmen had only managed to take the edge of the assault. The guards needed much time to reload their crossbows, and in that time, they were on their own - together with a handful of lords who had chosen to defend their hosts and their family. Not remembering when he had drawn his longsabre, Caden Ives stood directly in their path. Conscience makes cowards of us all, he thought as his green eye blinked, and the membrane of the Void shielded it from the horror, but courage is fear when it has said it's prayers. He was the Sword of the Ivy Cross.
Opposite the table, Miahala Sedai stood like him, prepared to defend their lives. Instead of awaiting the assault, like an animal due for the butcher's axe, Caden charged forward to gain the initiative. His blade became a whip of reflected light as it struck in wide arches, cut through white fabric, flesh and bone.
Between the three tables, two pathways was made towards the stage. Caden held his own in his pathway, while Miahala held the other. Nevertheless, white assassins streamed past them on either side of the hall, and with the panicked mob of nobles that tried to run up the two staircases, few actually managed to get anywhere. Young Lady Alassia and young Lord Tarili was trapped between massed bodies between the staircases, Lord Laugan Orryn and Lady Catvinya Masseroy was separated from their children by the press of the mob, shouting at the top of their lungs yet unheard in the chorus of panic and agony.
Time moves forward and events in one's life comes and goes... but nothing ever changes.
For yet one more time in her life, Miahala stood and prepared to fight. The intruders obviously had blood on their minds and their intent was clear. Most of the nobles had scattered in to ineffectual standstills where those who would defend blocked escape and the insurgents just before them. Only a few were prepared to fight and Mia would guess that only she and Caden had a real 'working' knowledge of such things.
Although she usually wasn't in formal wear when these things happened, so that was a new twist.
The One Power was a raging torrent through her body. Blood darkening white cloth was vivid to her enhanced sight and the noise was loud, the smell strong. It was disgustingly familiar and it was hard for Mia to remember a time when it had not been a part of her life.
Charging forward, the intruders came and some met a swift fate at the edge of Caden's blade while others were met by the weapons of the nobles who fought back while the guard reloaded their crossbows. New insurgents came in with their own bows now and took out several of the guard. Firing in the crowd was less tactically sound, so the majority of them were safe.
Mia let those with blades meet the forefront while her eyes narrowed like a hawk's on to the men in the back with bows... She only saw three, which was a surprise compared to the numbers of the rest of them, but she wasn't going to stop and ask why. At any moment, those bows could try to turn on Mia and Caden, for she knew they stood out.
Holding her arms above her, she took hold of threads of Air and narrowed them to points which she rained down upon the bowmen. Her skills and power were keen enough to do this with touching anyone else, but screams came from the men just before they crumbled to the ground in pools of their blood.
Mia did not stop to pay it much time. She could not afford to.
Some of those in the group nearest her had had the chance to figure out what she had done. For the first time, some of their eyes fell on her and recognized her for what she was: dangerous. Already they knew Caden for the threat he posed, but now they came to the realization that the two of them together were far more deadly than they originally thought. The surged forward to try to overwhelm the Aes Sedai and her warder.
During this time, the remaining guards had re-set their weapons and were able to take some out, but the layout was making it difficult to be sure that they did not hit any of the 'good guys' as it were.
A block of air burst forward from Mia as she reached into the hidden pocket of her skirt. Several men were knocked off their feet while she pulled out a fan. Two men recovered quicker than the rest and surged towards her as she snapped the fan open, and although their mouths were covered she was sure they were smirking like idiots.
One lunged for her and fell to the ground, screaming, burning. The other stumbled over his body, but came close. The sound of metal against metal was a high pitched musical note as he got close and she snaked her arm forward with long-time learned speed, the small razor-sharp blades protruding from the bone rods of her fan slicing his throat.
Mia turned back to the fight.
With the tables protecting his flanks, Caden faced a streaming line of white-clad, dead men.
He did not have to face more than two at the time, and when an opponent tried to get around him, he merely had to step in his way and give him steel arguments to not follow through with his intent. Onward this grim discussion raged, yet even though Caden was the better debater, he faced the threat of being outvoted by the sheer number of his unyielding competitors.
Why do they want to get past me? he asked himself in mad clarity while he made use of the heavy chair he had picked up with his free hand, crashing it to pieces across the hidden face of another cowled man. What are they after? Why do they sacrifice their lives for this purpose? He still held the splintered leg of the chair in his hand and used it to crack a kneecap as if it were an egg covered in white cloth. The arc of his sabre finished the job in a rising strike that made the crippled man fall backwards, even though he had running in the opposite direction.
Granted a mere moment of respite in the confusing and sudden struggle for his life, Caden ignored the cuts in his attire and body and looked across the table to see how Miahala was faring.
He saw her, glorious in the light of the chandeliers and holding her own against a flow of death equal to his own. Her dress looked impeccable despite the situation - a curious detail that somehow stood out in the midst of blood and strife. Seeing her like that, he could even imagine her to have produced her fan only in order to waft the smell of guts from her nose. The void shut the dark humor of it from his mind. Yet even though he would have looked at her forever, had he been granted the time, his mismatched eyes was drawn to the mob of nobles at the end of the tree tables.
The assassins were completely mingled with the guests at the banquet, so the remaining crossbowmen could do naught without risking innocent lives. Instead they tried to help people up the stairs so that more people could get away. In seeing how the assassins had made their way around the three tables to assault the desperate mob below the staircases, Caden saw where they strived to go, and understood. Damnation...
Rounding on the assassins that was nearly upon him, he used Whirlwind on the Mountain on the first one. One step forward towards a new adversary. The bells at the ends of his two braids chimed, but there was nothing merry about their jingle. Tower of Morning paired with Water Flows Downhill. He stepped across the flailing limbs below his boots, not stopping the motion of his sword. Moon Rises Over the Water. The Courtier Taps His Fan. He felled two more with Lizard in the Thornbush before he leapt up on the table, leaving his stand to run to the back of the Grand Hall, towards the stage and the massacre of innocents.
When he passed Miahala, he turned his masked face towards her in mid-stride. "They are after Lord Orryn's son!"
If Miahala turned to look at what was going on by the stage, she would see what Caden fixed his intent upon. Young Lady Alassia was pressed away from her loved Tarili. They screamed their names across horde of relatives and noble friends that nearly trampled them to the ground. Lady Alassia was being carried up the stairs by the throng, but Tarili was blocked from following by a wall of sweating nobles. But the assassins, they had only eyes for the young lord underneath the high arc of flower-arrangements. Like hawks they descended upon Lord Tarili of House Orryn. He did not see them, for he had only eyes for Alassia. He screamed over the din, screamed until his voice was raw.
The first three assassins cut their way to his side, and raised their blades simultaneously.
At reaching the end of the table, Caden leapt upon the upraised stage, landed with Thistledown Floats on the Whirlwind; a jumping spin-swipe. One of the three assassins' backs opened across the spine. While crouching, he used River Undercuts the Bank to sever the second one's right leg. He had gotten the third one's acute attention and blocked a brutal overhead strike with Low Wind Rising. Maintaining contact with the assassin's blade, he used Grapevine Twines to disarm him. The white-hilted sword clattered upon the floor, soon joined by the assassins' head.
"Listen to me!" Caden grated to the crying young Lord by his feet, "You are a Lord, make a stand or die!" There was no reaction save for a blink; shock written across a young face freckled with blood. With a curse. Caden reached down, curled iron fingers into the fabric of Tarili's coat. With a heave, Caden raised him to his feet. "Save your fears, take your place, save them for the day when your pain is far behind."
Even though Tarili did not respond, Caden picked up the assassin's sword and pressed it to the young Lord's chest. "You want to live? You want to see her again? It's time to make the sacrifice."
Auburn hair flashed in a semi-circle as Miahala spun to view the raised platform, which was lost amidst a sea of noise and people. Her vision narrowed briefly upon Caden as he ran forward, reaching the nobleman's son before any of the insurgents might be able to do so. The white-clothed men were pushing through the crowds, unable to take the same route as Caden due for the defensive line they met.
The Aes Sedai was very well aware of the fact that now she was the main line of defense here, though, because Caden was now with the nobleman's young son, the groom to be, and all Mia had were a group of other nobles looking to fight. They weren't too bad, but obviously did not have the decade's worth of experience, or the intensity of it, that Miahala and her Warder did, but they helped.
Hearing footsteps behind her, closer than the others, Mia spun back around to face forward and see three men in white coming for her. They must have seen her turned and thought that it was their opportunity to remove a large stumbling block in their plan. They underestimated her, though, and she spun to meet their charge. The closest, who stood in the middle, met her fan's blades with jab to the neck.
For the other two, she pulled her arms against her body and spun, stepping over the corpse of the man bleeding from the throat on the floor and escaping the two men by brazenly slipping between them, which they had not expected. Before they could turn to face her, she was pushing them forward with her hands between their shoulder blades, shreds of air sliding through their bodies and dropping them as she rushed forward again.
In doing so, she was able to again look up to the stage and the stairs, and she saw something that she believed Caden missed...
A small group of men dressed in white were pushing their way through the crowd and towards the stairs - towards young Lady Alassia. The main force was pushing to the main stage and the boy, but perhaps that was the distraction force. She had no doubt that they would grab for the young lord if they could, but they were obviously not just interested in the boy alone.
Mia pushed through the thin line of fighting nobles, using their line to cover her movement while she grabbed a dinner knife off the table. It was the only one that was left, after others having been taken up as weapons or knocked on to the floor in the rush. Its heft and weight was all wrong, but she'd make do. Narrowing her gaze slightly, she found the clearest shot of one of the men in white as she pushed through a clear area of the stairs and she threw the knife, catching him in the shoulder and causing him to fall down the stairs.
Three more pushed their way forward, though, and were heedless of their fallen comrade. These men were mad with determination, Mia thought to herself. She tried calling to the hapless, witless, girl who could not tear her eyes away from her betrothed long enough to realize the danger coming her way.
Lady Catvinya saw, however, but she was separated from her daughter as Lord Orryn was separated from his son. Over the noise, Miahala could not directly hear what it was that Catvinya was screaming, but being a mother herself, she could imagine pretty vividly.
The layout was not ideal for the Aes Sedai to reach the girl. This ridiculous get-up that she had been shoved in to for this affair did not make it any easier either, but she didn't own a dress that she couldn't fight in, if she had to. It just took a little more creativity.
On the stairway, the nobles seemed to have realized that there were enemies among them and some tried to run while some tried to fight. It caused a hassle of the first order and neither Catvinya nor Alassia could move from where they stood, both being women of small stature, good breeding and a life as noblewomen, thus lacking the necessary inborn brute force to push their way forward that Mia could employ having been born a farm girl of a working family. It was useful now, as she moved forward towards the stairs.
It wasn't enough, however.
Even for all her power, Mia could not move through the space between them quickly enough. On the dais, Caden was busy with his own group of insurgents to fight. Not much time had passed, but it seemed to be moving slowly. The enemy in white got to the girl before anyone else did, and there was nothing Mia could do to stop them without ending up killing the girl and all the innocent people around her. The girl was screaming, but was made quickly unconscious by a single hit to the face.
A low level of panic thrummed in her blood, mingling with adrenaline. It was not the sort of panic that lead to mistakes, but the sort that whispered that time was running out. (It did occur to Mia, however, that they did not kill the girl, so murder was not yet their intent with her...) Mia's eyes flickered over the table, finding another knife which she grit her teeth and threw, taking down another man in white just before they began to hurry up the stairs.
Up the stairs... she thought, staring a moment at their intended path with her brows knitting. She saw a window - it was high up, but they could go through it. Blood and bloody ashes!
Already behind her, noise was lessening and she knew that what men remained alive of those who surged in to this place were retreating. "Caden!" she screamed to raise her voice above the din, weaving together cords of air that she sent to try to pull the men back from the window, even if she could stall them only for a moment, then it might be enough...
It was too late.
They were through the window and the girl was with them with Lady Catvinya suddenly bursting through the crowd and up the stairs, falling screaming beneath the shattered window, kneeling on broken glass.
Aftermath. What was to be called the Blood Betrothal was at its end.
Objective achieved, the insurgents fell back and withdrew into the night, chased by the remaining guards of House Masseroy. In their wake, they left a gutted banquet. Caden Ives had only had another handful of foes to slay before he could gain the staircase where the abduction had taken place, but it was enough to delay him. All he could do, was to take his place by Miahala's side and see her safely to the end of the fighting.
A dreadful silence had descended upon the few remaining in the Grand Hall. All the guests had fled, and only Lord Orryn and his entourage had chosen to stay with the grieving mother of his son's love. Young lord Tarili was sitting on a chair, staring at nothing. Siu Laugan was standing below the dais, dealing out instructions to a never seizing flow of guards and spies.
Miahala and Caden were standing behind the kneeling Lady Masseroy, her hair stirring with the nocturnal breeze. The broken glass underneath her intricate dress glittered like stars in the moonlight. Caden cleaned his blade on the sleeve of his white coat, it was ruined anyway by the blood splatter. His white mask was sprinkled along with the hale side of his face, yet his long braids did not chime with murder anymore. His emerald eye rested first on Miahala, making sure the bond was not lying about the fact that she was unhurt, she could be ignoring pain as easily as he could. He had only sustained shallow cuts and bruises, along with a sense of weary irritation that he had disregarded the possibility that the Lady Alassia had been the true target.
Then his eye returned to Lady Masseroy. "My Lady," he rasped with a voice almost tranquil with empathy, something that rarely showed when addressing strangers. "They did not kill her for a reason of their own. But the fact remains they didn't. Find what reassurance you can with that she is alive, for then there is a chance to reclaim her."
Lord Orryn stepped forward beside Miahala and Caden, raising his voice before Lady Masseroy had any time to react to the words Caden spoke. "We will find them," said his stern lips, "My people are already questioning the few survivors. We will get answers. We will know where to look." His assurance brook no argument. He believed in what he said, and even if he were wrong, he would not admit it, both for Catvinya's sake as well as his son.
Tarili did not seem to hear what was said above. At least his seated form below the staircases did not stir.
Caden's eye turned to Siu Laugan, seeing how the white-haired man sending off guards to reinforce the defenses of the mansion. With his mind winding around the problem of learning the reasons for what had happened, around the problem of how the insurgents had been let through the heavily guarded outer gates, he continued to look at Siu Laugan while he addressed both Lady Masseroy and Lord Orryn. "Who?" he rasped. "Who could have done this against your Houses? Who had the military strength? Who had the motive?"
The comments and questions that Caden asked were wholly necessary, and Miahala knew and understood, but on a far deeper level and one that strove for precedence within her was the instinctual understanding of mothers and that went far past the seeking of tactical knowledge.
Her eyes were faceted on Catvinya as they all stood among the aftermath. Blood was everywhere, as were other remnants of the carnage and the flight of the nobles. She gave her Warder the briefest of glances and then walked over to the Lady of the House Masseroy.
Catvinya was a widow, but she was a woman of the House Masseroy and although her marriage many years ago had attached her to another noble house, it had been a minor one and dwarfed under Masseroy. Now, she was the oldest and most solid of this blood line. Her outgoing and casual demeanor was her nature, but it also was misleading for there was a shrewd, strong mind in her and it had held up her House through many years.
Now, all of it seemed worth nothing at all in the face of this crime. Mia could sense this, and could understand it. She walked over and bent down, kneeling with out her knees touching the ground or the glass that worked its way through Catvinya's skirts. The Aes Sedai put her arm around the other woman and spoke in soft, soothing tones that many would think belied her rank and her position, but this was past that.
"Come, Catvinya," she said quietly to the Lady, guiding her to her feet and away from the glass and the window. Voices in the background swirled around them, but details did not sink in as the Captain-General lead Catvinya to one of the few chairs that remained upright and sat her in it. Then, even in this foolish finery, she knelt down in front of Catvinya and rested her hands around the other woman's.
"We have known each other many years now," Mia said, speaking gently and with a kind and sympathetic smile. "Caden is right. They did not kill her here and they could have, so she is alive and that means she can be found, but first we need information. Who is the first to come to your mind that would wish to do this and would have the power to?" Her tone was kind, but firm.
Although she had been crying in silent sobs, Catvinya now looked at Miahala and visibly pulled herself together - at least enough to do as the Aes Sedai asked.
"Many of the other houses," she began in a voice still thick with emotion, "were against this union. They did not like the base of power that would occur if our houses were aligned, but the children's hearts-" Here her voice caught and she took a moment to let it pass, taking a slow breath before she continued. "Their hearts said otherwise, and we could not disagree simply because some silly nobles would be upset." Her words were slow and carefully thought out - slower than anyone had ever heard her speak.
Catvinya sunk her teeth into her lower lip in a gesture of anxiety and struggle for calm - it was one that she had done since she was a teenager, Mia knew. "Only two that I can think of, however, would have the power to accomplish this... unless three or more of the lesser houses aligned themselves, but I cannot envision that happened even at the Last Battle," she said, her smile sad. "It has to be either House Jesar or Maloun."
Committing those names to memory now, Mia nodded slowly but didn't have a chance to say anything in response before Catvinya was speaking again, her words speeding up but not with her usual effervescence but with panic seeping in yet again. "I had Alassia late in life, as you know, because I had trouble bringing a child in to my womb," she said, speaking to Mia as if there was no one else in the room, clutching desperately at Mia's hands.
"And when I found that I was with child, it was a miracle... and Alassia has been my miracle. Please, Miahala, I beg of you. You must find her. I know that you will have ways to find her that even the guard of my own home would not. Please. You are a mother, so you must understand..." Tears were floods upon her cheeks again. She swallowed visibly.
"Please..." Catvinya whispered, begging Miahala when Mia would bet that the noblewoman had never even considered begging for anything in her life.
Mia's ivory stone expression threatened to break, but she maintained it with a soft expression. "We will," she said softly. "We will find your daughter."
Meanwhile, on the terrace, Caden found himself in Lord Orryn's company.
"Lord Ives," said the man of the same age and resolve as himself, but when Caden turned to face the nobleman, he found a stoic man at a loss of words for the situation. "I... On behalf of my House. No, that's superficial to say. Rather, on my own behalf, as a father... Thank you for saving Tarili's life. Thank you, for keeping my son safe."
Uninterested, Caden fought the impulse to roll his eyes and walk away.
"I merely did the same as the other nobles who made a stand," he rasped instead, and bowed as a guest to his host, a gesture almost gagging when made in a hall littered with corpses; soaked in blood. His eye caught a small badge upon the pommel of Lord Orryn's sword. Caden froze, for just a moment - then he straightened. "I and they only differed in capacity. Honor them as you do me. I ask of nothing... except an explanation."
"Oh?"
"The Aes Sedai I ward was attacked," he rasped, the white eye shadowed by the bloodstained mask glaring, "at a banquet you hosted. And as you say, I did protect your son. Now, I am entitled to an explanation."
"What... would you have me explain?" stammered Jhevan Orryn and backed one step, "I am as much in the dark as everyone else. My guards will torture the truth out of the surviving attackers. In the meantime..."
"I doubt it. In the meantime, your external force will get away, while you provide wordless and quick mercy to your own injured men. The explanation I want, is why you staged the murder of your son in order to have Lady Masseroy's daughter abducted."
Lord Orryn's face drained of blood and he drew back another step.
Remaining still, Caden did not let his glare lift for a second. He continued to speak in his grating voice. "The insurgents could not have gained the mansion without someone letting them in. The outer gates could not have been breached without sufficient force and forewarning for the guests at the banquet to escape safely. Only by opening the gates to admit them could it have been done, and to do that, one has to kill the Masseroy guards in attending, from the inside."
Lord Orryn's hand was shaking, but he placed it upon the pommel of his sword. "Any of the quest could have accomplished what you say! How dare you bring these accusations to me? You forget yourself!"
"Because," he rasped without pause, "your son knew what was about to happen, and could not hide it. First I thought he was on edge because of his engagement, but there was far more fear than so in his eyes. Secondly, because you could not afford to have the other Houses turned against your own, so you stopped the engagement. Although, you still want to expand your powers by securing Lady Masseroy's daughter for later - when your plan culminates. You plan a second engagement, when everything has run its course."
This time, Caden stepped forward, forcing Lord Orryn back another step against the wall. "I'm sorry," he corrected as the wheels spun its fast course in his strategic mind, "it's not your plan. Someone is forcing your hand. Miahala has no enemies in the region. So, who wanted you to attack and kill my Aes Sedai's informant? Your immediate question would be why he had to die? Probably in order to get her here. Probably in order to have us try to reclaim Alassia, because Lady Masseroy and Miahala know each other since many years back. I now understand the scale of this attack too, because you had the Houses joined as guests here. Since they saw this massacre, they would never hold it against you if you joined forces with Lady Catvinya, out of sympathy for this manufactured tragedy!"
"I know nothing about some murdered informant!" Pristine beads of sweat upon Lord Orryn's forehead glimmered in the light of the chandeliers.
"Heraldry. The badge on your sword says you do, for we saw it at the scene," rasped Caden finally, and produced his longsabre the second time that night. The ring of steel freed from its sheath was too loud to not be heard in the entire Hall, in case Miahala and Lady Catvinya had not heard the intense argument. "Name your collaborator!"
Below the terrace, Tarili had gotten to his feet, shouting on top of his lungs; "No! Don't kill him! Then She will be dead by the morrow! Please! Have mercy! I will tell you everything!"
At the sudden words of the loud conversation, both women had stopped and listened. As it moved towards its echoing conclusion, both had gotten to their feet. While the Lady Catvinya's face grew flush with angry fire, Miahala's had gotten colder. "What do you know?!" Catvinya demanded, taking a step forward but Mia's hand went out and withheld her.
"You should not have his blood on your hands, Lady Catvinya," she said in a cold, even tone that she knew would sink in to the man's bones, as well as the boys.
The Aes Sedai stepped forward and paused, looking at the boy who withered under her and then towards the Lord who know stood at the edge of Caden's sword.
"You would do well to tell us what you know," she said to them both. An unnatural and intentional breeze drifted past the older of the two.
He eyed her uncertainly and then defiantly. "You cannot harm me... It is against your oaths, Aes Sedai, unless it is defense of your life," Orryn proclaimed.
A smooth brow arched on Mia's face. Her half smile was amused, and frightening. She knew what effect she had on people, particularly on fools. "You know something of Aes Sedai," she granted him, then pulled her fan back out, its blades retracted. She stepped towards him, fan open and in front of her face... and then in front of his. "But what makes you think the One Power is all I have at my disposal," she said softly, the sharp points emerging. "Besides, it is in defense of my life as we have already almost been killed for what you set in motion."
"Please!" Tarili yelled. "I said I would tell you everything!"
"Yes," Miahala said, putting the fan away. "I imagine that you both will," she said. "Isn't that right, Lord Orryn?"
The combined power of the Warder and his Aes Sedai stares were enough to break the nobleman. He knew that there were other powers at work, things to be afraid of, but those things were not standing in front of him. These two were, and he did not trust his knowledge of Aes Sedai enough to keep silent. This one... was fearful. "Yes," he said with a sigh. "I will tell you what you want to know."
"I thought you might," she said with a small, seemingly serene smile.
To some, her... theatrics might seem like over-kill or unneeded, but she needed Orryn and Tarili to both be very aware of who they were dealing with - not just Caden but Miahala as well, and it was times like these that such small dramas were required to be played out. (Meanwhile, inside, Catvinya had found Siu and summoned the remainder of her guard who were not elsewhere, so that Orryn and Tarili would not leave before things were done...)
Things were not overly complicated from there, however.
Orryn and Tarili were both intelligent enough to realize the threat before them and placed all the facts in front of them. Miahala would have been inclined to disbelieve, but enough rang true with other facts that Catvinya could supply. He was able to supply them with information to find where she was to be kept. He also supplied some information about his motives, but it wasn't much more than had already been figured out.
Orryn commented about there being other forces at play, but he didn't seem aware of what they might be... just that they were powerful and now that he had spoken to them, he was beginning to fear them again - but it was too late. He again insisted that he knew nothing about Mia's informant and the Aes Sedai was inclined to believe him, given what was standing before him.
"He's yours to do with as you see fit," Mia told Catvinya when it was over. "We'll find your daughter."
Catvinya's expression was a hard one as she stared at the man, but it softened briefly when she looked up at Mia and Caden. "Thank you, and I'm sorry. I had no idea..." For once, words were brief.
Mia shook her head. "You could not have known, my friend," she said, and Mia believed that, because she had known Catvinya a long time and her instincts said so. Yes, Mia had been betrayed and surprised before in her life, but the feeling was strong here. "We'll bring Alassia home."
Later on, the Grand Hall emptied from people.
The nobles withdrew, along with the guards that had Jhevan and Tarili chained and brought below to the dungeons. All the bodies had been cleared out, but the Hall itself remained as it was, a horrendous reminder of what had happened. It was as if a whirlwind of steel had passed through it, leaving it in shreds. The flower arrangements on the dais were speckled with red, yet remained standing in its original shape of multiple, high arches.
Only Caden and Miahala was still there, silent in thought.
Finally, Caden turned to her and took of his mask. He hung it upon the pommel of his sheathed sword. "My love," he rasped and sought out her gaze. "I have been thinking about what we spoke of earlier," he said slowly, not moving from where he stood a few feet away. "Before we came here."
A long time passed while these words hung in the air, before it was too unbearable to suffer their awkwardness.
He forestalled those words though, by stepping up to her. "My heart is in this," he said finally and took her hand, holding it in his own calloused fingers. He turned it over and ran his thumb along the gold of her serpent ring. His gaze dropped to it. "You might fear for my fate, because of your history. I do not care. If I am allowed to selfishly speak of what I want, you should know that I want you. For my own. I want you fully, desperately. You fear for me, for your own emotions regarding it, but I do not. I know where my heart rests, and it's in your embrace."
He looked up into her eyes, blinked. He opened his mouth to speak again, forestalling her, but then he fell silent. Instead he ran his arm around her waist and slowly walked up upon the days. His heart was racing, and he clenched his jaws against the trepidation. Once they stood below the flower arches, Caden turned to face her again.
"Let not this evening be a memory of an engagement ended in murder and betrayal," he said to her. "Let not this be a reminder of horror. I chose... to make it of joy. I want to even it out, and make it what it was meant to be. For I love you, Mia."
He dropped to one knee, much as he had done when they were Bonded. But this time, he did not swear upon his sabre. His pledge was made with one hand around hers, the other resting against his chest, over his frost-coated heart. A heart he had never thought would be able to love again. "I'm yours. Marry me, Miahala, for I want you fully, without discretion. Find it in your own heart to believe in us to that degree, and have us joined in wedlock as we were meant to be from the beginning. Our threads are entwined in the Pattern, we need only recognize it completely."
Holding her hand, he kissed it, closed his eyes in hope that she would understand him; to recognize his feelings for her as her own for him.
Miahala stood and stared at Caden as he knelt on the floor in front of her and there was no hope for Aes Sedai stoicism in that instant. She was simply in shock and unable to move or speak for several long moments. Obviously, their conversation before arriving had been washed from her mind in blood, by the battle they had just undergone and the subsequent revelations and planning...
Now, though, all of that was gone in light of this.
It was not the first time in her long life that she had been proposed to, but she felt as though it was the most surprising. She had never expected to fall in love again after all this time since her previous marriages, and Seth. She had thought that the end of it, but her feelings for Caden caught her off guard and she was glad for them, but... to wed again?
Not only that, but to wed her warder and when their shared life and now love was forever on the edge of battles like the one tonight, and ones even more difficult. Her chances of losing him, or of his losing her, were very great. She did not know if either of them could bear it, but...
Had they not already dared that? It was done. The bond of both One Power and emotion was already laid upon them and were they to lose each other now, the feeling would be the same: it would, most likely, destroy the survivor.
So... would a marriage bond make a difference in light of the possible pain? Most likely, the only difference would be in the living... the loss, were it to ever come, would be no less devastating. As he said, their threads were already entwined and the cutting of either would be the same, no matter what the marriage bond, or lack there of, would be.
And that, really, was her only fear: to lose another... but the emotions were there already and with no choice in that, so it was what it was - regardless of this, so what else would be reason to say no?
Nothing...
Finally able to move again, able to breathe and feel the beating of her heart hard against the inside of her chest, Miahala lowered herself to her knees before him, holding his hand close to her own heart, though she did not yet speak. All finery was forgotten, and the place they stood melted away from the inside of her mind and from her sight. It would return soon, but for the moment, nothing existed but him.
She kissed his hand in return, and both of his cheeks, then remaining leaned in close to him. Her eyes were wide open and on his, waiting for him to open them again. "I will," she whispered simply, her lips curved in a gentle smile.
Her words the ignition, Caden Ives' green eye sprang open.
The ones who had decorated the hall had not intended their ceremony, nor had they known what would befall the real ceremony when they did. In a way, the ones who had in the end become betrothed now honored the labor that had been put into the arrangement. Despite the fact that it had been a scene for unspeakable horror and bloodshed, the Aes Sedai and Warder had restored beauty by fulfilling the purpose. A betrothal had, defiant to circumstance, been realized.
It was pledge made together, between two mortals in the Pattern.
The dead were their witnesses, their lingering ghosts neither celebrating nor voicing protest. They needed no cheers, from dead or living alike. They only needed each other for their pledge. Considering whom they were, there could not have been a better place for their engagement.
"Mia..." rasped Caden finally when he found his damaged voice.
And then... the genuine smile he only gave her spread across half his face, an expression rarely seen but therefore more earnest than any other display of emotion. His whole appearance lightened with the radiance of his emerald eye, the gleam of his teeth. The blood that coated his white and black attire vanished in the joyful brilliance. The spirit of the man who he had been before came alive in those moments, appeared through the deep fog of his despair. Yet he was no stranger, because it was only the true ghost inside a harrowed shell. He was not two persons, but merely showed a forgotten facet of his soul; the key to his humanity.
It was the reason anyone could learn to love him; plainly seen in the light of the chandeliers.
When he spoke, the smile remained. "My future wife. I truly feared you would not agree, because of what you have suffered. As disparaging as I am towards myself, I am humbled that you will venture this with me. You melt the ice from my heart."
And he kissed her.
Eternity in an instant, and over all too quickly.
Despite vociferous internal protestation, the world began to slowly bleed back in to the silent white moment that they had been lost in. The real existence of things around them began to slip back inside Miahala's consciousness, although she fought it at first. Eventually, she did give in and let things return.
She pulled back from the kiss and smiled quietly, still in shock and barely believing of what had just transpired. She supposed that it was natural, in light of their feelings, but she still had never expected it... yet here, in the most and the least likely of places, it had happened and was now a part of her reality.
"We should," she began breathily after several moments had slipped past, "We should probably get back to our other tasks," she suggested. "Time is of the essence and we should be back about it." A quirky smile passed over her lips. "We will have plenty of time to rejoice once we are home again."
"That's quite true," he replied and rose to his feet. He pulled Miahala to her feet as well, but never let her gaze go. "We have a whole life together in which we can rejoice."
Thus, together, they left the draft of the Grand Hall, the dais glowing with the light of the swaying chandeliers. Miahala holding Caden's arm, they walked down the bloodstained carpet; a shade more red than it had been before. The ghosts of the dead, still thinking they were alive, followed them with their eyes. Death stood among them; their only true witness.
Silence descended upon the scene, once they closed the doors behind them.
The way back to their inn was eerily silent and uneventful in comparison of what had transpired at the Masseroy mansion.
They spoke little, finding warmth together along the alley of lit oil-lamps. What little time they had together before setting out was cherished, and they spoke as lovers did when alone. They were betrothed. Meant to marry, and it was not a light thing to digest, but the taste was sweet. The only difference between them and others that spoke so was their attire and the blood that witnessed that they had survived something unaccountable. Their situation was a paradox, but they chose, for now, to only see the joyful side of the evening.
Soon though, their minds turned to the task at hand, and Caden's uncovered smile receded in the prospect of what lay ahead.
At the inn, they changed their clothes to their regular traveling garments and packed their things in their saddlebags. They had grown silent, focused; their minds upon the best way to proceed. Their minds were attuned, sharpened to deadly edges. Pulling on a white shirt before donning his scaled amour, Caden was just about getting ready when he turned to Miahala.
They had been a Triad before. Now, the remaining reapers rose to the call. "You ready to feel truly alive again, my love?" he rasped to her and pulled on his baldric. If his steely gaze could be called anything, it would be 'eager'.
"I have already been given reason to feel alive this night," Mia told Caden with a smile. "Now, this is the time to remember the mission in this life that we've been set upon and what we gave ourselves to each other in the first place for. Let us be about it, then."
