The Beginning

[Anthony]

Drabic and Cronos along with the archers did their jobs well.

Cronos was a furry of movement. Spells being cast in all directions. Suddenly a bolt of lightning hit the tower that contained Rahl. The tower started to collapse. The enemy gifted knew the tower held their Lord.

"Go secure that tower!" Alaric barked to his soldiers.

The gifted became silent. The fighting had stopped.

Suddenly a figure appeared from the falling tower window. Joshua. He was pulling something out behind him.

"Rahl" Alaric whispered to himself. "Bring them to me. Drabic, Cronos" Alaric yelled. " Bring me the gifted that are still alive."

Alaric rode to where Joshua had emerged and made his way down, with Rahl slumped over his shoulder. Joshua dropped Rahl on the floor before Alaric.

"As promised" Joshua said.

" You are a man of your word." Alaric smiled." As am I. Ask anything of me that is with in my power to give and you will have it."

"As for you Rahl." Alaric bent down. removing something form his bag. He snapped the collar around his neck. It closed, there was no seam to reopen it. " A gift from Cronos. A Rada Han. Bind his hands and feet as well."

Cronos, Drabic and the captured gifted and Mord Sith emerged. Just then Rahl began to stir. He groaned. He tried to get up. He realized he could not move. Suddenly his eyes snapped open. He tried to take in the world around him.

"Stand him up." Alaric said.

They brought Rahl to his feet and face to face with the new ruler of D'Hara. The color drained from Rahl's face as he took in the captured gifted and Mord Sith. Their was no one to rescue him.

The Mord Sith Struggled to free herself. To get to Rahl, to protect him. " Lord Rahl!" She cried. "You all will regret the day your mother met your father!"

Alaric turned at gazed at the Mord Sith. Taking her in. She was a beautiful killing machine." Now now Selia." Alaric hissed. "You should not speak to the ruler of D'Hara in that manner."

"Let them go Alaric." Rahl said. The sound of command still in his voice.

"What position are you in to command anything Deneric? Incase you have not noticed I have won. I told you this would happen. I am a man of my word." Alaric stared at Rahl for a long moment.

The Mord Sith was still struggling fighting to be free. "Quite her Rahl or I will."

Deneric just stared at Alaric. Furry in his eyes. He hoped she would get free and kill him.

"Fine. Alaric turned to Selia. "Such a beautiful woman. Such a waste. Mord Sith for the most part are loyal till the end. These wizards over here. They know reason, they know that I have won and they will bend their knees to me. But you...You will try and kill me until one of us dies. I know. Remember I was trained by one of you. I know how you think. Such a waste." With that Alaric drew a knife and pulled it across her throat. " Told told you to quite her." He said turning to Rahl. " I can't have her trying to kill me all the time can I?"

[Anthony]

Cronos and Drabic had been at it for days. Along with the enemy wizards and sorceress that converted. How to bury the bond so deep under magic that it can not be felt. They worked non stop. Spell after spell. Both additive and subtractive. They said what they were doing was layering spells. One on top of another. Hundreds of them. Alaric could already feel the change in the bond. Soon it would be gone, well hidden.

Captain Torak and Joshua were next to him. "When they are finished Joshua and I will leave for the peoples palace with half of the army. Torak you will stay here in Caska. I wish for you to revitalize the city. Gather as many masons as you can. Rebuild. This will be our base to the south. The old world will not march all the way to the palace before they get a fight. I will also leave you a couple of the gifted to help protect this place. Send word to me if their is anything you need. Oh and one more thing Torak. I will be leaving Rahl here with you. Keep him in the dungeon. assign guards to watch him at all times."

Torak put a fist to his heart " It will be as you command my lord"

Lord Alaric Trabane. Yes that did have a nice ring to it.

[Anthony]

Alaric walked down into the dungeon where Rahl was being kept.

"You should have listened to me Deneric. You should have heeded my warnings. Now I will go to D'Hara and claim the throne. We will be a mighty nation again. Those who will not join us in freely will bow to us in defeat. Much the way you did. I will restore D'Hara to it's glory. You will be left here. Your bond is not felt by the Nation. They will be lost and powerless. They will look to me for guidance. I shall give it to them." Alaric paced the room. "Know that I hold no hate for you. Just pity. Pity and sorrow. You could of been the man to lead us in this journey but you choose to be weak. You choose to let our nation become a nation of talk and politics. D'Harans where meant for greater then that. Now we will begin our trek towards greatness again. The old world has a head start on us. They have a new emperor. Who is said to be cruel and calculating. I will show him the true meaning of those words. I will burn the old world to the ground and leave no man woman or child alive to reestablish its evil if I have to. It will be glorious. If you wish to be apart of it all you need to do is swear Fealty to me.
I no you won't but the offer is there none the less. Good by Deneric enjoy the rest of your life in this cage."

[Lord Rahl]

He woke with a start.
That was a change, he thought. He usually woke slowly, groggily, barely discerning the difference between sleeping and waking moments. They fed him little, and he rarely had any energy. It was for the best: his chains prevented him from being able to use any energy he might have. The Rada'Han was the worst, though. It cut him off entirely from his gift. Struggle as he might, he was unable to summon enough power to even light a candle.

He thought about his people, the people he had failed. Out of everyone in D'Hara, only the army believed in him. The army. Dear spirits, what army? Selia and her Mord-Sith were slain. Sometimes he had felt they were the only ones he could truly talk to. For all of their outward appearances of cold calculation and deadly intent, they were still caring women inside. They listened to him, gave him advice, and, most of all, they truly believed in him. The vivid image of Selia's gaping throat was stuck in his mind and it made him tremble with unrestrained wrath.

If he ever got his hands on Alaric, he would reduce him to a bloody pulp. Pah. Escape was impossible. He knew. For the first week of his imprisonment he had strained with all his might against the shackles of magic that held him firmly in their grasp. He stressed himself to his limits but he could summon no magic strong enough to break the hold of his restraints. His mind wandered again to the people he had failed. His people. All he wanted was the best for them.

Something snapped him out of his thoughts, startling him. The same something that had woken him not long ago. He tried to focus. The sound was repeated, louder now. Then he realized what it was: the sounds of the heavy, metal doors being opened. There were several that had to be passed through to enter his cell, each with several locks. At least, that's what he had been told by a grinning guard bringing him his food one day, eager to inform him about how hopeless he was.

And then the door to his cell swung open. A cloaked figure wearing the attire of one of the higher-ranking Free People guards advanced inside, somewhat cautiously, silhouetted in the dim light of the single torch outside. Then, suddenly, the guard threw the cloak off and rushed forward. Deneric was at first stunned and then overjoyed to recognize the face of the guard. It did not in fact belong to a guard at all: it belonged to one mistress Arya Meiffert of the Mord-Sith, whom he had long sing lost any hope of ever seeing again.

"Lord Rahl!"
He hadn't spoken since his capture, and at first it was a bit awkward. He worked his mouth slowly, wetting his lips with his tongue, with what saliva he could manage. They gave him little water.
"Wait, Lord Rahl," she said, putting a finger to his lips. "Eris! It's clear! Get in here!"
Perhaps even more surprising to Deneric was the sight of one wizard Eris, slinking in from the doorway, his barely adorned midnight blue robes billowing out behind him. He smiled, bowed quickly, and opened a small pack, pulling out a waterskin. He handed it to Arya who practically forced Deneric to drink from it while Eris pulled several biscuits from the pack.

After they fed and watered him, he was able to summon his voice.
"Get out!"
Eris blinked. Arya, naturally, scowled. "Lord Rahl, we did not come all this way just to leave before freeing you."
"I agree with Arya, Lord Rahl. We must get you free."
Deneric shook his head. "You don't understand. These bonds, all of them, they're magic. Welded on with both Additive and Subtractive magic. And this is no pretty accessory I am wearing on my neck. It is a Rada'Han. I can't use my gift to, in this case very literally, save my life."
Arya looked confuse but Eris understood, and so he spoke. "We can find a way, Lord Rahl. I have both Subtractive and Additive at my command as well and I know with time I can get them off."
"You don't have time, Eris. Roughly every two hours a patrol of guards come and check on me. To break me free you would need, at the least, six hours, a lot of luck, and another wizard, because two of them welded these things on."
Arya still looked confused, but now Eris looked panicked. "We can take out the patrols, Lord Rahl, and I know I don't need another wizard to break the restraints."
Deneric shook his head. "Don't be arrogant. The patrols are heavily armed and shielded against magic in case I somehow manage to get free. There is always a wizard with them. Even if you somehow managed to take one patrol down, if they didn't report back to their superiors within an hour, half the army would be sent down here to investigate."

Now both Arya and Eris looked desperate, not wanting to accept that their plans to help him escape were for naught. But before he could speak, there was another distant scraping sound, the same as the one that had abruptly put a halt to his rest earlier.

Someone was coming.

[unpopularprophet]

So long it seemed since that rainy day in Aydindril...so much had happened since. Aleister's seventeenth birthday had come and gone, and only regular use of his Gift kept him clean-shaven. It had been months since the Mother Confessor had had Dean put Aleister through a crash-course in Subtractive Magic, and Aleister's subsequent surpassing of Dean in the teen's dark element. Months since he had made his long trek to the Mud People. Months since he had made dear and close friends among those remarkable folk. Months since he had convinced the spirits to aid him in obfuscating the Mud People's land from anyone Aleister saw fit to block. Months. Weeks since he had set out for D'Hara, which, if the Mother Confessor was correct, held his destiny. Mere days since he had felt the death and battle around Caska as the Lord Rahl was defeated.
It was not clear to Aleister if this was the moment the prophecy that the Mother Confessor had revealed spoke of. But he did know, down to the core of his being, that this was the true beginning of his story.
Aleister could feel the life of every creature for miles around in his trance, but not one was aware of him. He could feel the patterns of life and potential death swirling on the veil in myriad shapes and colors that only he had ever seen. He felt in particular his objective...he could feel his sorrow, his self -doubt, and the silver band that restrained his power, the Gift of the true Lord Rahl. He could also feel the two on a futile attempt to rescue him. Futile...unless Aleister interfered. Which was exactly what he intended to do.
No guard saw him. None could even bring their subconscious mind to notice the shadows that clouded their vision in the night. Aleister left the camp untouched as he strode right past the guards guarding the entrance, the Gifted with them equally oblivious. Down the halls and stair he walked without sound...until he reached the mass of guards packed together, that the other two had passed under disguise and who knew what other methods. Aleister's power did not keep him from being solid. Sadly, his slipped out of the shadow to perform this grisly task.
Aleister's hair was shorter than it had been, and even more prematurely gray. He was a bit taller, and a shade more muscular. But hazel eyes, partially shrouded by the hood of his gray cloak, shone with a dark light that revealed the true depth of his strength. Only one managed to draw his blade, releasing a slight rasping sound, before death rained upon the unit of heavily muscle-bound D'Harans. The first few shriveled as if they had aged a thousand years. The next had splinters of blood spear out of their eyes and other soft places as every droplet of the substance froze in their bodies. The rest were shortly cut down by a silent wave of darkness. Aleister continued a while further uninhibited, drawing closer to his objective. One stray guard vainly drew his blade before the base of his brain evaporated in a cloud of darkness. Aleister had just begun to wonder at the absence of magical resistance when a vermillion bolt of light shot toward his heart, and smote there. The triumphant look look on the black-haired wizard faded as he saw no effect whatsoever. He looked into Aleister's compassionate eyes as the younger wizard rippled the veil about his elder, ripping the body into trillions of minute particles.
Aleister chided himself for his complacency. He had absorbed that blow at the last possible instant. He focused his being back into his special trance just in time to sense the arrow about to be fired. It was never fired.
All enemy forces in the dungeon neutralized, Aleister finished his journey to find himself at the end of an Agiel. Fighting to maintain composure, before either the wizard or the Mord-Sith had time to react, an otherworldly unlight latched itself onto Deneric Rahl's Rada'Han, weakening the powerful talisman, so Deneric might be able to utilize a degree of his Gift. The other bonds were stronger, but less complex in actuality. Nontheless, the sheer number and varieity of them combined made unraveling the convoluted mess a more time-consuming task than Aleister had anticipated, which meant he could not deal with them before the Agiel tapped his shoulder.
The cloud of cooling Subtractive he had readied did not fully blunt the effects. It took a serious effort of will to remain standing and refrain from even meager counter-attack until the Mord-Sith withdrew the weapon.
"Consider yourself fortunate. If I had not seen that your magic left Lord Rahl unharmed, that would have been the least of your suffering."
Maintaining his composure as best he could, he addressed the true Lord Rahl.
"I have enabled you to use your gift to an extent, but I fear that may be as much as I can do for you. I rather hastily disposed of the previous patrol and its wizard, and time is running out. The pattern of spells on your bonds is twisted, but by no means impenetrable. This wizard Cronos has a higher opinion of his abilities than is wise. If you wish, I can stay and help you unravel them quicker, but this is your call, by all rights. This opportunity for us to help shall almost certainly never arise again. What say you, Lord Rahl?"

[Lord Rahl]

Arya frowned. "How do we know we can trust you?"
Then Eris scoffed. "Why would we need to? What's he going to do, betray us and then send Lord Rahl back to the dungeon?"

But Deneric Rahl saw something in this man that the other two did not. He saw death. Looking into his eyes was like looking into the underworld through a pair of windows. There was something, some unexplained quality, about them that sent chills up his spine. But he could feel the Rada'Han had loosened it's grip. Not by much, but a wizard powerful enough could feel even that small change in the flows of magical power. He lifted his hand, palm up.

Concentrating the heat in the air into one point with the use of his gift, he attempted to light a flame. He achieved a spark instead. He tried again. And then a third time. Finally, a pathetic, weak flame flickered in his palm — and then it vanished. It was amazing how difficult it was to do so simple a task.

The apparent wizard standing in the doorway spoke. "You see? I have not harmed him. I have loosened his restraints. If I sought to do you harm, I would not help you first."

Arya was about to voice another protest, but this time, Deneric spoke. "He's telling the truth. This man is immensely powerful. I have no doubt that if he wanted to harm me, he could do so."

"We have to get him out of these chains," said Eris. "With two of us it shouldn't be hard — I can sense that they are not shielded."

Deneric barely noticed the heavy, metal shackles around his legs anymore. He didn't waste the effort to try and get them off himself. He knew he was too weak in this state, without enough control over his power to do anything meaningful. He looked at the young man again. "As you said, a patrol will be here soon. We need to escape before then. Once they find out what's happened, the whole army will be after us and then we will not be able to escape. I would be very appreciative if you helped us."

[unpopularprophet]

"Time is not our friend, then."
Aleister knelt beside the Lord Rahl and sighed lightly. In that one small moment, despite the grey hair, the silently murmuring air of the Underworld about his face, and the power in his eyes... In that fleeting moment, he looked young. Aleister looked like a seventeen year old boy, who had never killed until but a few months before, never been quite used to such massively important things that Rahl had been raised with, never even kissed a girl. He looked like a kid.
But the moment was fleeting. Aleister closed his eyes, and reopened them with a look of iron resolve. His hazel had darkened in the dim light to a curious iron grey that looked firm as steel, a molten grey darker than the shoots of silver in his hair. Aleister's eyes almost glowed, not with magic, but the sharp determination of... A Rahl...
His finger's caressed the chains, weaving back and forth as if feeling a fabric's weave. Aleister soon found a seam, as it were. His head turned abruptly towards Rahl's wizard, and spoke.
"That there. There are many spells here, and many nasty surprises that you might have set off had I not made it here. But this here... Is wear it all weaves together to the single purpose of restraining Rahl. If Cronos had been just a shade more meticulous, he might have found it better to keep each spell independant, rather than layering them like this. This way, however, while it takes more effort to undo... Pricking the right thread will make the whole unravel. But make no mistake, Cronos was only being a little careless..."
Aleister's dry, sardonic commentary soon quieted as he carefully wove his power into the labyrinthine knot of magic, feeling Eris trying to follow his power... Yes Eris, that was his name. Aleister could still feel the near-death that had been on the D'Haran, and it made certain things all too obvious... But now was not the time to think of that.
Eris had managed to find the knot, and Aleister gently corroded certain lines of power... And both he and Eris felt the opening, and proceeded to rip the knot open. Within a second, the rest of the magical structure crumbled in on itself, releasing another bit of Rahl's power back into his command.
They all froze. There was the unmistakable sound of hobnail boots in formation. But they passed the dungeon... Meaning there was but a few minutes to release Rahl left.
"Here comes the fun part..." He and Eris, in sequence, grapsed the Rada'Han, and Rahl put what effort he could into finding the kink in the Rada'Han's magic, that Aleister was locating and plucking with a careful amount of Subtractive...

Then the twist was obvious to Rahl, blaring it's presence loudly in Rahl's magical ears. Rahl threw his power into the twist-------

* Snap* The silver band fell into the dirt covered stone.

[Lord Rahl]

Rahl reached up to his throat and rubbed it gently, feeling the area where the Rada'Han had been. He felt liberated. He supposed he was.
Then he turned his attention to the symphony of boot-clicks that grew in sound as the patrol, which he could now sense to be made up of some twenty men with the aid of his gift, grew closer.
It seemed that they knew there was something wrong.
But they didn't yet know just how wrong.

He took a moment to revel in the feeling of his gift, savoring the unique feel that he had for so long taken for granted. He let the intertwining powers of both light and dark, Additive and Subtractive, apart and yet together, wash over him. The boot-clicks became roaring rivers, the breathing of his companions sharpening. He opened his eyes and lifted a hand, fingers splayed open, towards the open door.

Running soldiers turned the corner.

As the leading soldier opened his mouth to yell something, Deneric fisted his hand and the soldier fell, clutching at his chest, as his heart stopped. The soldiers behind him were silenced by a sharp current of air that scythed them down. At least, it should have. Only a few of those soldiers were actually cut, and not all the way through. He raised his hand again, but before he could act, it seemed that the shadows in the cell rushed out, crowding the soldiers, covering their faces, suffocating them.

He looked to the side and saw the man who had helped him also had a hand outstretched.

Now that Deneric had used his gift he realized he sensed something within himself, a weakness. He had gone so long without using the gift, but more than that, the restraints on him had sapped him of his mental strength. He needed rest more than anything.

"We have to hurry. Arya, I can walk. Really. You're not going to carry me."
She looked suspicious but desisted her attempt at picking up a man twice her size and carrying him, for the moment, at least.

Rahl turned his gaze on the mysterious stranger. "Thank you,"
he turned and walked out of the door, the others following him. He didn't have the mental strength to use the gift, but he was talented with a sword, and eager to put his physical talents to the test. "Tell me, what is the name of my savior?"

[unpopularprophet]

"Savior? Hardly... I was just in the position to help when the opportunity arose. But my name is Aleister Brighton, of Hartland. Obviously, there is more to Anyone than their name, but now is hardly the time to swap life stories."
Aleister slipped part-way into his spirit-trance, making his outline appear to waver at the edges. He could sense several deaths in the immediate future. On one path, the deaths included their own. Obviously not to be preferred. Another path still held much death, but they might yet surive it. There were many other things involved, but the primary concern was escaping alive. All paths where they lived involved them taking the route through the eastern door, where troops were less concentrated. But they would have to have a distraction to maximize chances of escape. But what? What could possibly keep an entire army occupied? The thought flitted across Aleister's consciousness, and he held it and considered it. It would be very risky. He had learned many things in his time at the Keep... And many more during his spirit-journey with the Mud People spirits. Aleister smiled at the thought of the people that had adopted him, but shuddered internally at the memory of some of the things the spirits had shown him. Knowledge they only imparted to fellow spirits...
Plan in mind, he whispered to the other three. "I have a plan, but I warn you, I am not sure of what might happen if you intervene." The Mord-Sith looked suspicious but undisturbed, but the wizards looked at each other warily. They were beginning to piece together what Aleister was... And they seemed unnerved. Even as Aleister swung off his cloak, he felt the familiar feeling of separation, of being pariah. The curiosity in there eyes sparked when Aleister sat, removed his shirt, baring thin but hard and distinct musculature, and removed from his belt two knives... An ancient dacra, and a bone knife of the Mud People adorned with raven feather. He took the bone knife in his right hand, and drew a small dribble of blood from his arm, his face unflinching. He then carefully placed the two weapons tip to tip... And activated the dacra. Rather than the usual flash as life force was drained from the organic material, the blood, glowed... And multiplied, spawning ever more blood as Aleister inked symbols on himself. A negative times a negative is a positive, and there was no shortage of blood in the Underworld. Contrary to what conclusions the two elder Wizard's might have drawn, it was only Aleister's Gift that called blood from the ether. The dacra simply gave the multiplied blood similar properties to sorcerer's sand.
Aleister quickly and carefully penned images of the dance with death over his torso and face, finishing with a symbol far older than the Confessors it was thought to represent. He painted twin lightning bolt over his cheeks, eyes, and forehead. Then, having quickly competed a ritual that had not been seen since the Great War, he tilted back his head... And let his spirit out on a leash. He still was aware of his body, but as something a little separate. Aleister's projected mind fanned out, and latched onto the captain of the next patrol, and seized control. This was incredibly dangerous. It would be east to become overwhelmed by the twin flows of information, but he need not linger too long. Both Aleister and the captain started muttering in an ancient Low D'Haran tongue from the north, a flowing and subtly otherworldly speech, now and the interspersed with patches of the Mud People tongue. Aleister called the Underworld into the captain's body, much like he had done with the blood. But he did not call blood into the man. He called the watchdogs of the Boundaries, the creatures that had once eclipsed fear of the wolf. Aleister called a Hearthound into the captain's body, and the two melded, forcing him into convulsions. The patrol had now stopped, and the junior officer tried too late to aid the captain. When he laid his hand, on the captain's body, then the body explosively expanded in the space of a second, stretching the leather armor, sprouting tan fur, knees bending the other way, face expanding into a long snout, limbs elongating, growing two feet of height and fifty pounds of muscle In a flash the Heartbeast ripped the officer's throat out with his claws, had mauled seventeen of the others, hearts torn out and devoured, and set off into the camp for prey, leaving two other men convulsing, shuddering, expanding into unnatural predators, as hardened warriors in the camp began screaming like children with the terror of the Other Side.
Aleister jolted back into his body, the echo of the taste of blood on his tongue. It had seemed hours to him, but the whole action had taken but three minutes, and the screams were now joined by the sound of unearthly howls.
"That should occupy them for a while..." Aleister said, then struggled not to vomit at the thought of the horror he had unleashed, all to save on man to preserve the security and justice of the New World.

They were as quick and strong as a destrier, more vicious than a rabid dog.These creatures would laugh at Additive, and resist most Subtractive. They would consume the camp like a plague, and having no where else to go, they would turn on each other.



The howls rose in unison as Aleister rose from his position. He would have nightmares about this. But not just from a guilty conscience, which he most definitely had.

Aleister could still taste the blood. A roar of sensations welled in his mind as the first Heartbeast, the man Aleister had twisted so thoroughly, continued his bloody rampage. The dual sensations filled his mind, and he had to fight to shut them out.
The spirit-link was always risky, but Aleister had inadvertently forged a link between his mind and that of the Heartbeast by unleashing his dark Gift into the former man. Aleister fed a de-stressing spell, which forced his stressed body to relax. Just as the first blood tear appeared in his eye from the pressure of another mind, with his own cleared he managed to suppress the sensations... Temporarily. Aleister had a foreboding feeling, perhaps from his Gift, that he would be linked to this monster he had created until one of them was dead.

[Lord Rahl]

Crickets chirped in the night as Deneric stood at the edge of the small cliff. In the distance, far away now, stood Caska, and farther out still the Azrith plains. He sank back into the deep tree cover, where the three sat huddled with their hands around a large stone. He was afraid that an open fire might draw attention, but it was a cold night, so he used his gift to heat a boulder. It still radiated some warmth.

He did not know where they were going to go, other than "away from Caska." He considered Aydindril — perhaps the Mother Confessor would help him. He had heard good things about her in the past.
He sat down, across from the strange man who helped free him, Aleister.
"What do you have to say about our course of action? That is assuming, of course, that you wish to stay with us. I have a feeling that our escape will be one of the less perilous events in our new adventure and I would not wish to subject you to worse. But we could use your help."

[unpopularprophet]

Squatting, Aleister rolled to the balls of his feet and stood, stretching his long limbs, and lightly torquing his torso. He silently, swiftly, and shortly cut off another glimpse of carnage, blood and bone and brain and beckoning... Which restored clarity to his thoughts. The distance seemed to lessen the severity of the link, but could not quite suppress it entirely. Aleister put the matter out of his mind for the moment: the beast couldn't last too long.
"I did not come in after you just to leave you again. I have confidence in your abilities to survive," he said, pausing to indicate the really quite lovely heated boulder, "But, every bit helps and... I very much have the potential to BE a perilous event for any who threaten you." He fell silent a moment as a particularly wraith-like deathscream pierced the distance to reach them faintly. Aleister looked up into Rahl's eyes with a hint of a painful glow.
"Those men were not evil. Trabane, probably. Cronos, most likely. " Another scream. "The men, the ones who truly believe they are fighting for D'Hara, the men who came after us in the dungeon, who probably knew it was suicide... They did not deserve what I did to them. Few rate that level of torment. They were, however, a threat to you." The hint became a tangible aurora on an iron grey and sage green iris field. "You and the Mother Confessor are the New World's best and most reasonable hopes for a united defense. The Mother Confessor would never capitulate to Trabane, and Trabane will not accept anything less. The threat for further conflict that Trabane poses must be neutralized, and D'Hara must be led by the Lord Rahl. Anything else will shatter when dashed against the Old World. For freedom to have a real chance, I cannot allow you to fall. I did that to those men so that you might escape and live. I am not about to abandon you now." The aurora faded, and with it the thirty years of age the seventeen year old had seemed to put on. "And if my opinion is of consideration, I would say that we should either head to Aydindril, or continue north and east into the Faijin."

[Lord Rahl]

Arya's tired eyes shifted quickly to look at Aleister, now alert and, surprisingly, slightly fearful.
Deneric did not have so pronounced a reaction. He merely stared at Aleister for a moment, thinking.

Arya spoke first. "We cannot go into the Dark Lands. That would be suicide."
Eris had an expression similar to that of Deneric.
"Arya," Rahl began. "The Dark Lands are indeed a dangerous place. But if we cut straight to Aydindril from here, we'd run across Alaric's men. Over and over. Maybe we'd survive the first time. Who knows, the second and third times, we might escape. But Alaric has a web of men that grows bigger daily. We can't risk it. And Aleister is obviously a wizard of great talent. But, furthermore," he added, casting a sidelong glance at Aleister. "He is very skilled with underworld magic. I have no doubt he could protect us very well in such a place."

Arya's next protest was cut short by the voice of Eris. "Arya, Lord Rahl has made up his mind. And I think it's a good decision."

Deneric nodded his thanks to Eris. Then he looked at Aleister once more. "We'll go north along the edge of the Azrith plains. When we get to the People's Palace we'll stay tucked into the tree cover. We won't be easily noticeable. After we pass the palace and put a good amount of distance behind us, we'll hit the Dark Lands, and from there we can go north-west, up above Aydindril, entering at the edge of the Faijin province. From there we can go west into the Namir province and from there, south into the mountains where the Temple of the Winds rests. Then we can enter Aydindril discreetly. Eris can go into some of the small villages on our way across the plains and get us food. What do you think of that plan?"

[unpopularprophet]

"It's sound. I can even help when it comes to food, later: I do well in forest, and, well, I am quite efficient when it comes to dealing Death... even if only to Dinner. In the mean time, I suppose I can get to know you all... And hopefully vice versa. If you aren't bursting with questions, I'm a ferret named Odgen. And I. Am. Not. A. Ferret. " A small grin wormed its way onto Aleister's face as he sarcastically punctuated each last word. "We had better get some rest soon, but I might as well give some beginning of an account for myself... Where to start... Well... I guess at the beginning..."