Alathea hears Litheene's pleas for haste, and although she agrees with them, she knows that she must stay, at least for a few more moments. With the effort of weaving saidar and the fear of the situation, her voice is somewhat strangled. "We will flee, but we must not let these creatures live to follow us!
Seeing Jasper's joy at the destruction and his pleasure at slowly cooking Myrdraal, Pace's voice seethes with anger, "Jasper, were you always like this or have you already fallen to the Taint?" He immediately turns to Alathea, "Those knots will hold for days. If the flaming Seanchan come and collar all of you and kill us men, then it won't matter if you have killed a single Light forsaken Mydraal! We just destroyed a city block and lit up the Illian with all of your channeling. Stay if you want to be collared." Pace looks around and gets his bearings before he starts jogging down an alleyway.
Litheene is in favor of leaving the shadowspawn bodies for the seanchan. The seanchan don't believe those creatures exist. Leaving them will cause havoc among them, and also they might be taken accounted for the destruction (as seanchan don't know about their actual abilities). They might buy us time
Oh Pace. always the jokester.slapping the guy on the back, Jasper turns away, with a look of longing on his face as he watches the buildings burn.
Seeing Pace jog down the alley, Jasper quickly hurries and catches up with him.
alright. so now we need to get out of the city fast. should be easy enough.
Jasper glances back one last time, his gaze landing onto the buring Fade. still, if only we could make it suffer longer...HAHAHAHA
Ryland stops firing his bow and slowly turns around looking at his companions and pausing for a moment to look blankly at Fiallan's spear of fire. He slowly slings his bow and picks up his sword, cleaning the gore from the blade almost as an after though before sheathing it on his hip.
"Am I the only normal mortal person here? I am surrounded by people who can channel. Burn me even the damn Aiel can! Get your kit and lets go. I think if they caught and executed me it would be a mercy."
He glances up one more time at the burning Fade and shivers.
At Pace's urgings, Alathea stops her weaving and releases saidar regretfully. Pace is a Borderlander; if he says to run from these Shadowspawn, I will trust him. He should know what he is doing, yes? She turns to follow him and starts down the alleyway at as brisk a pace as she can manage with her wounds.
Before Pace turns down the alley he turns to Alaetha, "Give me the bracelet. It is our responsibility, not yours." He holds his hand out to Alathea, his expression stern and unyielding.
Really? Here? Now? With as much noise we, well, i mostly, just made? You question my sanity the most, and here you are, with the entire city coming down on us, demand the relic, and right out in the open too? what if others are watching us? Right now, they dont know who is carrying the thing. so the threat is spread out amongst us. But if she passes it along to you, in the open, then you will be targeted by the enemy, and if they come in great numbers, even linked we will not beat them. So hold off for now, you light blinded fool.
At Pace's urgings, Alathea stops her weaving and releases saidar regretfully. Pace is a Borderlander; if he says to run from these Shadowspawn, I will trust him. He should know what he is doing, yes? She turns to follow him and starts down the alleyway at as brisk a pace as she can manage with her wounds.
Seeing that Alathea is wounded, Litheene moves to her, puts a hand on her shoulder and channeles a quick weave of healing to aid her.
Level 1 healing using level 0 slot.Are you alright? Sorry it's all I can do now, but we have to flee
Litheene turns to Pace I gave the terangreal to Alathea, however I have no problem with you having it, despite terangreal being a property of the tower in general, if we make haste now
Jasmine decides that the fire accomplishes much the same thing as lifting and dropping so she ties off the weave and hurries after the others. Arriving at the alley she says, Come! Jasper is right! Now is not the time. Considering the matter finished she says to Alathea and Litheen Let us link together and then any sul'dam who thinks to capture us will have a rude surprise. If you will permit, I will guide the flows as I have the most experience in battle. With that she waits for their reply and if favorable, links with them before continuing, on the lookout for the slightest sign of channeling.
Jasmine decides that the fire accomplishes much the same thing as lifting and dropping so she ties off the weave and hurries after the others. Arriving at the alley she says, Come! Jasper is right! Now is not the time. Considering the matter finished she says to Alathea and Litheen Let us link together and then any sul'dam who thinks to capture us will have a rude surprise. If you will permit, I will guide the flows as I have the most experience in battle. With that she waits for their reply and if favorable, links with them before continuing, on the lookout for the slightest sign of channeling.
1d20+5; 1d20+10
Litheene agrees to link.
She also lends the angreal to Jasmine, as Jasmine is leading the circle.
Alathea stares at Pace for a moment, her face unreadable. "Do you really trust me so little? I agree with Jasper, now is not the best time to exchange it. But if you have such distrust in me, I will give it to you now."
Alathea is happy to link with Jasmine and Litheene, and wordlessly takes their hands. Opening herself to saidar, she adds her strength to that of the other women.
linking? are you three INSANE!!! Linking! In broad daylight...well, night, but not the point. The time for an offensive is past. now its time to be like a thief in the night. unseen, unheard. Not a young bull charging after a cow in heat through a glass house. everyone looks at me like im the crazy one. But right now, within the same breath, i heard two idiotic, ridiculous, irresponsible, and CRAZY he shoots a glare at litheene, jasmine, alathea, and Pace ideas. and yet, here i am trying to be the sane one. So how bout this for sanity; three of you will not embrace saidar as long as your lives are not in direct danger, and pace and I wont demand the bracelet. If you want to be a beacon for the seanchan, then give us the bracelet so that the rest of us can get away. Jasper finishes with holding his hand out.
Jasmine continues walking, completely ignoring Jasper. Her only concession to his rant is to weave several threads of air and fire into a web around the group, causing them to disappear from sight.
Pace's expression softens slightly at Alaetha reluctance, "This not about trust, this is about responsibility. That Ter'Angreal is Jasper and mine." When Litheen mentions that the Bracelet is property of the tower his face hardens once again. "Don't even think about making a claim on this particular item. It will be destroyed as we have been ordered. The Aes Sedai are no longer in the position to claim every item of Power in existence." He looks to the group as a whole and sighes. "This is why such a large group is dangerous. We should already be moving, but here we are debating precedent."
Alathea merely smiles sadly at Jasper's beratement. "At this time, I doubt there is anything we can do that will make us more conspicuous than we already are. Jasmine and Litheene are both familiar with these Seanchan, and if they think that Linking with each other is a good idea, I will trust to their judgement. Let us flee as quickly as we can, and worry about such things later."
Alathea smiles at Pace as well, not sadly but...mischeviously? "Very well, if it is a matter of responsibility, I will take responsibility for the safety of the item until we are no longer fleeing for our lives, at which point I promise to give it to you immediately. You, then, are responsible for keeping me safe until such a time, yes?" She resumes a sober expression. "Unless you insist. I will give you the item now if it is of that much importance. And I make no claim to it; it belongs to you and Jasper."
Rolling his eyes at the sheer stupidity on display, Jasper cannot believe what is happening infront of him.
No, now i am with Pace. If you all want to be linked, fine. i cannot control that. But if you want to be a beacon, then you give up the Ter'angreal. Now. And dont even run your mouth about white tower property, Litheene.
Finishing the shadowspawn you turn and race down a neighboring alley. The light of the fires follows you for some distance and at one point you hear the roar of a collapsing building. You encounter few people in your flight and those you do look as nervous and scared as you yourselves. No one gives you a second look as you race through the dark streets.
Sometime later, minutes or hours its hard to tell with all of the adrenaline, you reach the outskirts of Tanchico. You're nowhere near any of the main roads, losing your bearings as you fled. Stretching before you is knee high grasses and copses of trees. In the distance you can see a few different scattered farms, not close enough to be a part of the city proper.
Pausing to catch your breath you look behind you and see a huge plume of smoke rising above the city as the fires aparently continue to burn.
Once 'safely' outside the city, Fiallain breathes a sigh of relief and slowly removes her veil. Her spear had long sensed ceased to burn. "Well then, that was fun... One problem though - besides having burned down half the town. Weren't we supposed to meet someone in the city with that thing? Or were we still going to fight it out to determine who gets to carry the thing?
Seeming a bit exasperated at it all, she stalks over next to Ryland and squats on her heels as she leans the spear over her shoulder. Positioning herself so she can gaze back from the way they come, she keeps a sharp eye out for any sign of pursuit.
Jasper gives a start when Fia brings up meeting our contact. Blood and Ashes! How could we have forgotten something that simple. Oy. Jasper smacks his head, and then turns to gaze upon the burning city.
Isnt that just an amazing sight? he sweeps his hand across burning city with a broad smile on his face. just beautiful
Turning back and facing the group. so, we are in Tarabon. we have the item. our contact to get us out of here is in the burning city. and we are over 1000 miles away from Caemlyn. i say we check out one of those farms and see if they are deserted or not. if they are, we can crash there til the city stops burning.
True to her word, Alathea walks over to Pace and gives him the bracelet as soon as she and her companions stop to catch their breath. "As promised, Pace.
Alathea frowns at Fiallain's words; in the fear and excitement, she has indeed forgotten about the Salt Spray. After a moment of consideration, she suggests, "We should stay away from the city for a day or so to let things return to normal, then send in Pace and Jasper and maybe Ryland to meet with this contact. They are not at risk for detection by the Seanchan, and as just a few people, they will be less conspicuous than the whole of us, yes?"
Litheene sighs in relief the moment we reach the city primiter. After the circle breaks, she takes the angreal back, and weaves a False trail level 4 (using 3rd slot) to make it look as if the party run away into the wild.
Then she turns back to the party: Pace, Jasper, be at peace. I gave you the item, didn't I? And specificaly said I don't place a claim on it. You are welcome to do with it as you please
Also, if you need to report back to someone in town, I strongly suggest we keep out of it Litheene glances back nervously. After waiting we can send some messanger to the place of the meeting, and ask your contact to change the meeting location. It can be delivered in a phrasing which won't reveal to an unsuspecting messanger what this is all about
Litheene also offers healing to Fiallain and Jed. If they accept, in order: level 3 using 1 level (angreal+affinity) for each. Fiallain: Jed:
Alathea, I'm sorry I couldn't help you more, but we were in a rush
Alathea shakes her head at Litheene's apology, smiling warmly. "You did as well as you could, and much better than you seem to think. I am well."
Jed will gladly accept Litheene's Healing, having now gotten rather used to the idea of being touched by a channeler's Weaves. Jed feels a sensation as if he is rushing somewhere without actually moving and his body grows cold during the Healing. And when he finally opens his eyes, he sees that his wound is closed with barely a scar remaining, though dried blood still remains. Flexing his muscles, Jed nods to Litheene. "Thank you."
"So what does this item do anyway? It must be important if both the Asha'man and Darkfriends are after it. I wonder how they found out about the thing."
Well thank you very much litheene for giving us permission to handle the ter'angreal.Jasper snaps off in a snide remark. More useless than an Illian wench on her birthday
watching Alathea pull the ter'angreal out of her pouch, Jasper asks her to place the item on the ground. Pace, before we grab it, you and i must take special care. My fear is that this ter'angreal affects male channelers directly, and once it is in our hands, itll attempt to fasten itself to our wrists. perhaps we should protect ourselves before touching this thing. i propose this. one of use should handle the object. that man will have his wrists bound by air to prvent the item from latching itself onto a wrist. Your hands will still be free to examine it, but you wont be able to move your arms. Should it not feel like its not going to attempt a latching, the other male channeler can drop the air weave and allow free movement of arms.
If he is so worried about handling this ter'angreal, why didn't he just let Alathea keep it until we are in relative safety? Blood and bloody ashes, I just don't understand him...
Jed doesn't speak his thoughts aloud, not wanting to add to the disparity in the group.
Ryland glances sideways at Fia's spear and sits down on his pack. "We need to lay low for a while that is for sure. Setting a city on fire has ways of making you a wanted man...or woman. I do agree though, I will acompany someone to meet the contact, just so we can be gone from here."
He sits and watches the smoke rise from the city for a while before shaking his head and while still looking in that direction adresses the others. "You people cuase more distruction by your brief actions than a division of siege devices. There is no acounting of the damage to property, not to mention the posible loss of inocent lives. And you stand here bairly blinking at what you have done." Ryland pulls a dagger from his boot and stabs it into the ground. "You have all of this destructive power at your finger tips but a feathers width of sense on how to use it. Is it any wonder that your kind has been feared and hated through out the years?"
Jasper opens his mouth to make a retort, but closes it with an audible click.
smoothing out his face, Jasper replies i think we should head back into town, right now, with all the confusion to mask our movements. We can talk about risk/rewards and who's responsible for setting the town on fire when we are many leagues away from here.
Alathea listens quietly to Ryland's chastisement, frowning. After he finishes, she doesn't speak, but nods as if in agreement, then walks a dozen yards or so away from the rest of the group and sits down in the tall grass. He is right, of course. We were fighting for our lives, but does that excuse the destruction we have wrought? I cannot take the Oaths soon enough! But she shakes her head ruefully. Though the Tower works for the good of all, it is held in fear and hatred by too many. Even were I bound by the Oaths, Ryland would not see me as any less dangerous and unpredictable, nor would those he claims to speak for.
Gathering yourselves together, you set off through the grasses looking for a likely place to hide and collect your thoughts. The walk is long and uncomfortable and its already dawning on some of you that you have no idea how you're going to retrieve your horses from your inn.
Approaching different homes you are dismayed to see that they are all occupied. Despite what you would expect the Seanchan have apparently not been harsh in their subjugation of the native peoples as other invading armies might be. In fact most of the farms you see seem prosperous, at least as much as any can be in this unnatural heat.
Dawn rises as your fruitless search continues when finally Ryland comes back to the group indicating he's found a suitable, although not ideal location. Following him through some of the scraggly trees you come upon an abandoned shack set off in the middle of the woods. Long grasses surround the structure and its clear that it hasn't been used in years. Alathea begins to ask what it was when the direction of the wind changes and your noses are assaulted by the rank smell of a small tannery. Ryland shrugs his shoulders. Best there is I've seen.
While pungent the smell clearly isn't nearly as bad as if the shack was in full use, the smell merely unbearable instead of downright sickening. Scanning the interior of the shack it's contents are very minimal, having been cleared when it was abandoned. But the roof seems fit and there's space enough for everyone to rest inside.
Pace nods at Ryland, "I regret my decision to release a fireball. I wanted to use something less destructive, but feared for those of you being attacked right away. You are right we must use more sense when we utilize our powers, or there will be repercussions that we are not prepared for." During the last statement he obviously stares at Jasper.
Pace does take Jasper's suggestion on handling the item with care, and afterwards he pulls the man aside. Before starting he takes a deep breath,trying to find his center. This better work, he is degrading so fast. Or has he always been this way and it just took this long to see it? "I have made comments before, but so far just in anger. Perhaps it is time we address it in a more rational manner. As Ryland pointed out, we probably injured many innocent people this evening. I regret my part in the destruction we caused. You seem to relish it. This is not viewed well by our companions, whom we may need in the near future. Frankly I fear that they think you are going mad, if you are not already there. I am beginning to think so too. You know what those 'Reds-in-training' will do if they get a chance. You also know what I will have to do if you become more dangerous than useful. I beg you, please show more restraint in your actions and words before it is too late."
Alathea looks around at the shack skeptically. It takes her a great deal of effort to keep her face serene at the rank tannery stench, but she manages. It is better than nothing. I must remember that.
Jasper looks Pace in the eye, and for once, anger doesnt fill them. Its shock.
Restraint? For what? speaking the truth to those reds? Enlightening her to what to look forward to, a lifetime of hunting us down? His gaze lands on Alathea, and for a moment, a brief look of longing crosses over. And restraint in my actions? yes, you are possibly right, me dropping that massive fireball and saving everyone probably wasnt in good taste. Perhaps next time i should just ask the Fade to go away? feeling his anger and resentment start to rise, Jasper quickly smothers it. that was uncalled for. I am sorry. dont let the women know i said that. I know your looking out for me; and my actions, while they do get the job done, have been excessive.
Jasper pauses a moment and collects his thoughts. and in regard to my madness. Sure, i know that the taint has started to affect me. I am sure it is lowering inhibitions to a point, but i am still all there. Would you be questioning my sanity if i was like Ryland? instead of using the one power to kill, i use a sword to carve up the Fade into little pieces, knowing that it cannot die for a long time, thus making it suffer? I doubt it. You would all slap me on the back and say "good job". Sure, the sword is only affecting the Fade, and there is little chance of harming an innocent intentionally, but what about when Ryland was shooting his arrows at the thing? What if he had missed, and the missed arrow fell and hit someone else? an innocent? Would you be questioning his sanity or telling him to aim better? Is it regrettable that now the fire is burning and may consume the city? Sure. Would i do the same thing again if anyone's lives here were in jeopardy? In a hearbeat. My actions my be bold, forthwright, and a touch excessive, but as long as everyone here is safe at the end of the day, i can sleep well at night. He finishes in a suprisingly calm voice.
Alathea watches Jasper and Ryland prepare to return to Tanchico and meet Deloval's contact. She knows that re-entering the city is a risk for her, but she itches to have something useful to do. Instead, she turns to Jasmine, Litheene, and Fiallain. "While it is dangerous for us to return to the city, we can ensure that we are all ready to leave this place when the men return. I would like to go and retrieve our horses, but I am unsure of where we left them. Perhaps one of you can remember, and we can all go and finish that task more quickly?" As she speaks of the danger of returning, she casts a sharp eye at Fiallain, but does not bring up the Aiel's ability directly.