“As long as I can see where to weave,” Aviendha replied, staggering to her feet. She wobbled sideways and barely caught herself short of falling. Blood flowed down her sleeve from a wicked gash. “I think I can.” She vanished behind the gateway, and the fireballs continued. You could see through a gateway from the other side, though it appeared to be a heat haze hanging in the air. You could not walk through from that side, though—the attempt would be extremely painful—and when Aviendha reappeared, she was stumbling well wide. Birgitte helped her mount her gelding, but backward, of all things!
When Birgitte motioned fiercely to her, Elayne did not bother with shaking her head. For one thing, she feared what might happen if she did. “I’m not certain I can hold on if I try to get up.” In truth, she was not certain she could get up; tired was no longer in it; her muscles were water. “Ride as fast as you can. I’ll hold on as long as I’m able. Please, go!”
Muttering curses in the Old Tongue—they had to be; nothing else ever had the sound!—Birgitte shoved the horses’ reins into Aviendha’s hands. Nearly falling twice, she hobbled to Elayne and bent to take her by the shoulders. “You can hang on,” she said, her voice filled with the same conviction Elayne felt from her. “I never met a Queen of Andor before you, but I’ve known queens like you. A backbone of steel and a lion’s heart. You can do it!”
Slowly she pulled Elayne up, not waiting for an answer, her face tight, every stab in her leg echoing in Elayne’s head. Elayne quivered with the effort of holding the weave, holding that one thread; she was surprised to find herself erect. And alive. Birgitte’s leg throbbed madly in her head. She tried not to lean on Birgitte, but her own trembling limbs would not support her completely. As they lurched toward the horses, each half leaning on the other, she kept looking back over her shoulder. She could hold a weave without looking at it—she could normally—but she needed to reassure herself that she really did still have a grip on that one thread, that it was not slipping. The gateway now appeared like no weave she had ever seen, twisting wildly, wreathed with fuzzed tentacles.
With a groan, Birgitte heaved her into her saddle more than helped her. Backward, just like Aviendha! “You have to see,” she explained, limping to her gelding; holding the reins of all three horses, she pulled herself up painfully. Without a sound, but Elayne felt the agony. “You do what needs doing and leave where we’re going to me.” The horses leaped away, perhaps as much from eagerness to be gone as from Birgitte’s heel in her own mount’s flank.
Elayne hung on to the high cantle of her saddle as grimly as she did to the weave, to saidar itself. The galloping horse flung her about, and it was all she could do to remain in the saddle. Aviendha used her saddle’s cantle as a prop to keep herself upright; her mouth hung open, sucking air, and her eyes seemed fixed. The glow surrounded her, though, and that stream of fireballs continued. Not as fast as before, true, and some shot wide of the gateway, streaking trails of flame through the grass or exploding on the ground beyond, but they still formed and flew. Elayne took strength, made herself take strength; if Aviendha could keep on when she looked ready to fall on her face, she could, too.
At a gallop, the gateway began to dwindle, brown grass stretching out between them and the opening, and then the ground was slanting upward. They were climbing the hill! Birgitte was again the arrow in the bow, all focus, fighting down the agony in her legs, urging her horses for more speed. All they had to do was reach the crest, reach the other side.
With a gasp, Aviendha sagged onto her elbows, bouncing on her saddle like a loose sack; the light of saidar flickered around her and was gone. “I cannot,” she panted. “I cannot.” That was all she could get out. Seanchan soldiers began leaping into the meadow almost as soon as the hail of fire ceased.
“It’s all right,” Elayne managed. Her throat was sand; all the moisture that had been in her now coated her skin and soaked her clothes. “Using an angreal is tiring. You did well, and they can’t catch us now.”
As if to mock her, a sul’dam appeared in the meadow below; even at half a mile there was no mistaking the two women. The sun, low in the west, still flashed glints off the a’dam linking them. Another pair joined them, then a third, and a fourth. A fifth.
“The crest!” Birgitte shouted joyfully. “We made it! It’s good wine and a well set-up man tonight!”
In the meadow, a sul’dam pointed, and time seemed to slow for Elayne. The glow of the One Power sprang up around the woman’s damane. Elayne could see the weave forming. She knew what it was. And there was no way to stop it. “Faster!” she shouted. The shield struck her. She should have been too strong for it—she should have been!—but exhausted as she was, barely clinging to saidar as she was, it sliced between her and the Source. Down in the meadow, the weave that had been a gateway fell in on itself. Haggard, looking as though she could not possibly move, Aviendha hurled herself from her saddle at Elayne, carrying them both off. Elayne had just time to see the far slope of the hill below her as she fell.
The air turned white, blanking her sight. There was sound—she knew there was sound, a great roar—but it lay beyond hearing. Something struck her, as if she had fallen from a rooftop onto hard pavement, from a tower top.
Her eyes opened, staring at the sky. The sky looked, strange somehow, blurry. For a moment she could not move, and when she did, she gasped. She hurt everywhere. Oh, Light, she hurt! Slowly she raised a hand to her face; her fingers came away red. Blood. The others. She had to help the others. She could feel Birgitte, feel pain as bad as what gripped her, but at least Birgitte was alive. And determined, and angry apparently; she could not be injured too badly. Aviendha.
With a sob, Elayne rolled over, then pushed up to hands and knees, her head spinning, agony stabbing her side. Vaguely she recalled that moving with even one broken rib could be dangerous, but the thought was as hazy as the hillside. Thinking seemed . . . difficult. Blinking appeared to help her sight, though. Some. She was almost to the bottom of the hill! High above, a haze of smoke rose from the meadow beyond. Unimportant, now. Not important at all.
Thirty paces up the slope, Aviendha was on her hands and knees, too, almost falling over when she raised a hand to wipe away blood that poured down her face, but searching anxiously. Her gaze fell on Elayne, and she froze, staring. Elayne wondered how bad she looked. Surely no worse than Aviendha herself; half of the other woman’s skirt was gone, her bodice torn nearly off, and everywhere skin showed, there seemed to be blood.
Elayne crawled to her. With her head, it seemed much easier than trying to stand and walk. As she came close, Aviendha gave a relieved gasp.
“You are all right,” she said, touching bloody fingers to Elayne’s cheek. “I was so afraid. So afraid.”
Elayne blinked in surprise. What she could see of herself appeared in every bit as bad shape as Aviendha. Her own skirts remained intact, but half of her bodice was ripped away entirely, and she seemed to be bleeding from two dozen gashes. Then it struck her. She had not been burned out. She shivered at the thought. “We are both all right,” she said softly.
Well off to one side, Birgitte wiped her belt knife on the mane of Aviendha’s gelding and straightened from the still horse. Her right arm dangled, her coat was gone, along with one boot, and the rest of her garments torn; as much blood stained her skin and clothes as either of theirs. The crossbow bolt standing out from her thigh seemed to be the worst of her injuries, but the rest certainly added up to as much again. “His back was broken,” she said, gesturing to the horse at her feet. “Mine’s well, I think, but the last I saw of him, he was running fit to win the Wreath of Megairil. I always thought he had a turn of speed. Lioness.” She shrugged, and winced. “Elayne, Lioness was dead when I found her. I’m sorry.”
“We are alive,” Elayne said firmly, “and that is what counts.” She would weep for Lioness later. The smoke above the hilltop was not thick, but it rose over a wide area. “I want to see exactly what it was that I did.”
/> It took clinging to one another for all three of them to stand, and laboring up the hillside was an effort of panting and groans, even from Aviendha. They sounded as though they had been thrashed within an inch of their lives—which Elayne supposed they had been—and looked as though they had wallowed in a butcher’s shambles. Aviendha still carried the angreal tight in her fist, but even if she or Elayne had possessed more than their small Talent with Healing, neither could have managed to embrace the Source, much less channel. At the top of the hill, they stood leaning on each other and stared at devastation.
Fire ringed the meadow, but the heart of it was blackened, smoldering and swept clear even of boulders. Half the trees on the surrounding slopes were broken or leaning away from the meadow. Hawks began to appear, riding the hot air rising from the fire; hawks often hunted so, looking for small animals chased into the open by the flames. Of the Seanchan there was no sign. Elayne wished there were bodies, so she could be certain they were all dead. Especially all of the sul’dam. Gazing down at the burned, smoking ground, though, she was suddenly glad there was no evidence. It had been a terrible way to die. The Light have mercy on their souls, she thought. On all of their souls.
“Well,” she said aloud, “I did not do as well as you, Aviendha, but I suppose it worked out for the best, considering. I will try to do better next time.”
Aviendha glanced at her sideways. There was a gash on her cheek, and another across her forehead, as well as a long one laying open her scalp. “You did much better than I, for a first try. I was given a simple knot tied in a flow of Wind the first time. It took me fifty tries to unweave even that without having a clap of thunder in my face, or a blow that made my ears ring.”
“I suppose I should have started with something simpler,” Elayne said. “I have a habit of leaping in over my head.” Over her head? She had leaped before looking to see whether there was water! She stifled a chuckle, but not before it sent a stab through her side. So instead of chuckling, she moaned through her teeth. She thought some of them might be loose. “At least we’ve found a new weapon. Perhaps I should not be happy about that, but with the Seanchan back again, I am.”
“You do not understand, Elayne.” Aviendha gestured toward the center of the meadow, where the gateway had been. “That could have been no more than a flash of light, or even less. You cannot tell until it happens. Is a flash of light worth the risk of burning out yourself and every woman closer to you than a hundred paces or more?”
Elayne stared at her. She had stayed, knowing that? To risk your life was one thing, but to risk losing the ability to channel. . . . “I want us to adopt each other as first-sisters, Aviendha. As soon as we can find Wise Ones.” What they were to do about Rand, she could not imagine. The very idea that they would both marry him—and Min, too!—was worse than ridiculous. But of this, she was sure. “I don’t need to know any more about you. I want to be your sister.” Gently, she kissed Aviendha’s blood-stained cheek.
She had only thought Aviendha blushed fiercely before. Even Aiel lovers did not kiss where anyone could see. Fiery sunsets paled beside Aviendha’s face. “I want you for my sister, too,” she mumbled. Swallowing hard—and eyeing Birgitte, who was pretending to ignore them—she leaned over and quickly pressed her lips to Elayne’s cheek. Elayne loved her as much for that gesture as for the rest.
Birgitte had been gazing behind them, over her shoulder, and perhaps she had not been pretending after all, because she suddenly said, “Someone’s coming. Lan and Nynaeve, unless I miss my guess.”
Awkwardly, they turned, hobbling and stumbling and groaning. It seemed quite ludicrous; heroes in stories never got hurt so they could barely stand. In the distance to the north, two riders appeared briefly through the trees. Briefly, but long enough to make out a tall man on a tall horse, galloping hard, and a woman on a shorter animal running just as hard at his side. Gingerly, the three of them sat down to wait. That was another thing heroes in stories never did, Elayne thought with a sigh. She hoped she could be a queen to make her mother proud, but it was clear that she would never make a hero.
Chulein moved the reins slightly, and Segani banked smoothly, turning on a ribbed wing. He was a well-trained raken, swift and agile, her favorite, though she had to share flying him. There were always more morat’raken than raken; a fact of life. Down in the farm below, balls of fire were leaping out of the air apparently, scattering in every direction. She tried to pay no attention; her job was to watch for trouble approaching from the area around the farm. At least the smoke had stopped rising from where Tauan and Macu had died in the olive grove.
A thousand paces above the ground, she had a very long view. All the other raken were off scouting the countryside; any woman who ran would be marked for checking, to see whether she was one of those who had caused all the excitement, though truth for sure, anyone in these lands who saw a raken in the air likely would run. All Chulein had to do was watch for approaching trouble here. She wished she did not feel an itch between her shoulder blades; it always meant trouble was on the way. The wind of Segani’s flight was not bad at this speed, but she drew the drawstring of her waxed linen hood tighter under her chin, tested the leather safety straps that held her in the saddle, adjusted her crystal goggles, snugged her gauntlets.
Over a hundred Fists of Heaven were on the ground already, and more important, six sul’dam with damane and another dozen carrying shoulder bags full of spare a’dam. The second flight would be lifting from the hills to the south with reinforcements. Better if more had come in the first strike, but there were few enough to’raken with the Hailene, and strong rumor had it that many of those had been given the task of ferrying the High Lady Suroth and her entire entourage down from Amadicia. Bad to think ill of the Blood, yet she wished more to’raken had been sent to Ebou Dar. No morat’raken could think well of the huge, ungainly to’raken, fit only to carry burdens, but they could have put more Fists of Heaven on the ground faster, more sul’dam.
“Rumor says there are hundreds of marath’damane down there,” Eliya said loudly against her back. In the sky, you had to speak loudly, over the rush of wind. “Do you know what I’m going to do with my share of the taking gold? Buy an inn. This Ebou Dar looks a likely place, what I saw of it. Maybe I’ll even find a husband. Have children. What do you think of that?”
Chulein grinned behind her wind-scarf. Every flier talked of buying an inn—or a tavern, sometimes a farm—yet who could leave the sky? She patted the base of Segani’s long, leathery neck. Every woman flier—three in four were women—talked of a husband and children, but children meant an end to flying, too. More women left the Fists of Heaven in a month than left the sky in half a year.
“I think you should keep your eyes open,” she said. But there was no harm in a little talk. She could have seen a child move in the olive groves below, much more anything that might threaten Fists of Heaven. The most lightly armored of soldiers, they were about as hard as the Deathwatch Guard; some said harder. “I’ll use my share to buy a damane and hire a sul’dam.” If there were half as many marath’damane down there as rumor claimed, her share would buy two damane. Three! “A damane trained to make Sky Lights. When I leave the sky, I’ll be as rich as one of the Blood.” They had something called “fireworks” here—she had seen some fellows vainly trying to interest the Blood in Tanchico—but who would watch such a pitiful thing compared to the Sky Lights? Those fellows had been bundled out and dumped in the road outside the city.
“The farm!” Eliya shouted, and suddenly something hit Segani hard, harder than the worst storm gust Chulein had ever felt, tumbling him wing over wing.
Down the raken plunged, screaming his raucous cry, spinning so fast that Chulein was pulled tight against her safety straps. She left her hands on her thighs, tensed on the reins but still. Segani had to pull out of this himself; any twitch on the reins would only hinder him. Rolling like a gambling wheel, they fell. Morat’raken were taught not to watch the ground
if a raken fell, whatever the reason, but she could not help estimating her height every time a whiplike tumble brought the ground into sight. Eight hundred paces. Six hundred. Four. Two. The Light illumine her soul, and the infinite mercy of the Creator protect her from—
With a snap of his broad wings that jerked her sideways and rattled her teeth, Segani leveled out, the tips of his pinions brushing treetops as they swept down. With a calmness born of hard training, she checked the motion of his wings for strain. Nothing, but she would have a der’morat’raken examine him thoroughly anyway. A tiny thing that might slip by her eyes would not escape a master.
“It seems we’ve escaped the Lady of the Shadows one more time, Eliya.” Turning to look over her shoulder, she let her words trail off. A length of broken safety strap trailed back from the empty seat behind her. Every flier knew that the Lady waited at the bottom of the long fall, but knowing never made seeing easier.
Offering a quick prayer for the dead, she firmly pushed herself back to duty and urged Segani to climb. A slow, spiraling climb, in case of some hidden strain, but as quick as she thought safe. Maybe a little quicker than safe. Smoke rising from beyond the knobby hill ahead made her frown, but what she saw as she cleared the crest dried her mouth. Her hands stilled on the reins, and Segani continued to climb on powerful sweeps of his wings.
The farm was . . . gone. Foundations scoured clean of the white buildings that had stood on them, the big structures built into a hillside smashed heaps of rubble. Gone. Everything was blackened and burned. Fire raged through the undergrowth on the slopes and made fans a hundred paces long into the olive groves and the forest, stretching from the spaces between the hills. Beyond lay broken trees for another hundred or more, all leaning away from the farm. She had never seen anything like it. Nothing could be alive down there. Nothing could have lived through that. Whatever it had been.
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