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Post by Kitsun on Dec 7, 2003 4:04:43 GMT
PTS: Magic, angst, language, blood. I'd rate it PG-13, possibly R, as it goes on.
The Legend of the Red Dragon
Author's Note: If any of you have ever read Wheel of Time, know this is a horrible slash fic. We take everything, butcher it, and make it our own. This contains no spoilers into the book, as it's set before the fall of the Fifth Kingdom of the Borderlands. Feel free to read on, if you can tolerate language, angst, and violence. Thank you for reading.
Chapter One A Meeting
A tall unicorn, rather unusual for her species, being black-furred and having a long, spear-like horn, was plowing her way through forest brush with the stolid expression of, “do what has to be done and be done with it”. In the wake of the unicorn came a young woman, no more than sixteen or seventeen, her brown hair pulled back in a long braid, green eyes flashing in annoyance at her unicorn companion. “What’s wrong now, Nironai?” the unicorn asked in a tone of long-suffering, though she hadn’t looked back to see the annoyed look. She stopped, dropping her head to ground level, and began rooting under the brush for something, her teeth clicking. “What in the name of the Light are you doing, Silver Phoenix?!” demanded Nironai, using the unicorn’s full name as a sign of her irritation. “There’re good greens under here, Nironai Al’Thariain, and I’m going to get them. Unlike you, I don’t want to eat my rabbit stew with just water and rabbit tonight, like we have for the last few days. Now, why are you glaring? Trying to singe my tail off?”<br>Nironai seized her braid in one fist, tugging on it slightly. “SP, the only reason we’re out here is because you took a job for us without asking me!”<br>Complacently, the unicorn said, “You could have stayed behind, you know. I didn’t make you come along.”<br>“Oh, and that would have been a pretty incident! An Aes Sedai without her Warder. For some reason, I don’t see that going over very well.” Nironai remarked sarcastically. “You did quite well for several years without a Warder,” Silver Phoenix pointed out. “Although, you are quite an interesting little Green Ajah…” she added under her breath.
Nironai was a young woman from the Borderlands in the north of the world. As such, she had the typical braid of the women, along with the predictably short temper of all Borderlanders. She was also an Aes Sedai, a woman who could draw upon—channel—the stray energy of creation, the One Power, and “weave” the force to her will. The Aes Sedai had several divisions, known as “Ajah”. Nironai was a member of the green Ajah, the warriors of the Aes Sedai. Silver Phoenix was a member of an obscure race of unicorns known simply as “warriors”. In the simplest sense, she was a soldier first, second, and third; precious little mattered besides that. She had come to this world during a war that had drawn all the worlds together, forcing the people of all the worlds to fight together or perish utterly. In a rather curious incident, the unicorn and Nironai, already friends, had been bonded as Warder and Aes Sedai. A Warder’s duty was to care for and watch over their Aes Sedai, something that Silver Phoenix did wholeheartedly. Unusually, the unicorn could channel as well. The Aes Sedai who bonded the two didn’t know this at the time, so Nironai had been teaching the warrior unicorn how to use her newfound power, though she often “forgot” it existed.
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Post by Kitsun on Dec 7, 2003 4:05:31 GMT
“That’s not the point!” Nironai shouted. “I don’t have any desire to be hauled back to Tar Valon by my braid because of you!”<br>“Now why would they haul us back to the home of all Aes Sedai for a little thing like that?” Silver Phoenix asked practically. “RAAH!” Nironai roared in a fit of temper, nearly yanking her braid out by the roots. “YOU’RE SUPPOSED TO BE MY GUARDIAN, NOT A MONEY-GRUBBING MERCENARY! YOU’RE SUPPOSED TO PROTECT ME, NOT WHOEVER PAYS YOU!”<br>The unicorn blinked benignly. “You have to admit, it has its advantages…” Wisely, Silver Phoenix didn’t clarify which option had the advantages, and continued down the path. About a half an hour later, Silver Phoenix dropped back from her leading position to walk next to Nironai. Whispering, she asked, “Have you felt someone following us?”<br>Nironai nodded slightly, more of a twitch to chase away a bug than anything else. Above them, a tree moved, though a keen observer would notice it was moving from north to south, while the wind was blowing east to west. “I told you…” the black unicorn muttered. “I know,” Nironai started to say, before something large and black fell out of the tree, accompanied by a broken tree branch. “GERROFF ME!” Nironai shrieked in outrage as the thing landed on her. The thing that had fallen out of the tree appeared to be a human, though the strangest human either Silver Phoenix or Nironai had ever seen. His hair was bright blue in color, thick and gathered in unplanned clumps that resembled spikes, quite wild looking, a small portion of it pulled back in a short ponytail. Stranger yet, he had metal on his arm, leg, and face, with wires running from them to vanish below the pale skin. His eyes were hidden beneath small, round, and very bright red glasses. On the other hand, Nironai was hidden underneath the person’s long black trenchcoat, fuming in outrage. What was worse, the stranger didn’t seem to notice her at all. “Damn, that hasn’t happened to me in a few years… Must be losing it.”<br>Quite abruptly, the man was hoisted up by the collar of his coat, hanging from Silver Phoenix’s jaws. He blinked at her, saying, “Oh, hello. Who’re you?”<br>“Who the hell are you, where the hell did you come from, and why the hell are you following us?” Silver Phoenix snapped, fairly angry. “I’m me. I’ve been here for a while, and I’m following you because I’ve never seen a pair of people like you two before.” he said, evading most of the questions skillfully. Nironai scrambled to her feet, cursing viciously, trying to tear her braid out by the roots. She glared at the man all the while. “Hello to you too.” he said pleasantly, hanging from Silver Phoenix’s strong jaws, listening to Nironai curse. “Sorry, I don’t have a bar of soap handy.”<br>Her eyes widen as she turns red in fury, pulling harder and spitting curses that made her previous ones seem like children’s rhymes. “I take that back,” he said suddenly. Silver Phoenix let out a muffled, “Good.”<br>“I don’t have a case of soap.”<br>Nironai splutters curses before throwing a complete fit, nearly taking off his head in anger. The only reason she didn’t was because her Warder would have been caught in the crossfire. He blinks mildly before vanishing from the unicorn’s jaws, reappearing nearby. “Personally, I think you need anger management classes.”<br>Completely forgetting herself, Nironai hauled back and punched him. “I didn’t feel that.”<br>“Oh, you’ll feel this…” she hissed, shooting off a fireball. “Hm, that’s interesting.” he noted, from ten feet away. He is abruptly hoisted up by Flows of Air, spun about like a top, and then slammed down on the ground, headfirst. “Did you feel that?” she snapped waspishly. “…ow.” He sat up and rubbed his head. “Huh, a channeler. Shoulda known it, with my luck.”<br>Nironai fixed him with a pointed glare. He just shrugged and grinned. Losing her temper again, she slapped him. Mildly, he asked, “What was that for?”<br>Silver Phoenix, finally tired of his irritation of Nironai, lashed out with one hoof, sending Tekk spinning. “Well,” a cheerful voice said, “Now that you’re done beating up the assassin, why don’t you introduce yourselves?” A woman with short black hair and blue eyes, wearing a cloak covered in brilliantly colored fluttering patches, was leaning against a nearby tree. At her feet rested a case that held a lap harp. She bowed dramatically, sweeping the gaudy cloak—as if it couldn’t have been noticed. “Thomadrili Merrilin at your service!”<br>“Oh, a gleeman…” Silver Phoenix groaned. “Oh, a Warder!” Thomadrili said brightly. “An assassin!” Nironai yelped, focused on the strange man. “Yup.” he said, completely unperturbed. “I’m an assassin. My name’s Tekk.”<br>“Well, what about you two?” Thomadrili asked cheerfully. “I’m Silver Phoenix. She’s Nironai.”<br>Nironai watched Tekk with narrow eyes. “Are you here to kill one of us?” she asked suspiciously. Tekk laughed. “No way! If I was, you’d be dead by now. Like I said, I’d never seen a pair of people like you before. I was being nosy when I followed you.”<br>Silver Phoenix got the now larger group moving again, headed southwest, towards the next town. Thomadrili was humming under her breath, jotting down lyrics as they came to her, often bursting into song spontaneously. Nironai continued to curse at Tekk, who by existing, managed to infuriate her. The unicorn Warder sighed. It was going to be a long journey.
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Post by Largo LeGrande on Dec 7, 2003 20:39:54 GMT
Ooooh cool, put more up soon!
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Post by Kitsun on Dec 7, 2003 20:49:38 GMT
I'm actually working on Chapter Five right now, but I wanted people to be able to read it chapter-by-chapter, rather than be swamped in four long chapters at once.
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Post by Largo LeGrande on Dec 7, 2003 21:10:01 GMT
Hehe, that would be a little discouraging. I wouldn't be able to read them all today anyway, I have to revise for my driving thory test tommorow. Wish me luck
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Post by Rimmer on Dec 8, 2003 0:47:03 GMT
Amd I read this. And she claims that I am a good writer. Well, it is satisfactory to say that I don't compare too well.
But I like my style better than anyone elses. Oh, and thanks for clearing things up for the Wheel of Time illiterate.
Please post more.
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Post by Kitsun on Dec 8, 2003 2:48:28 GMT
By popular demand, Chapter Two!
Chapter Two A Small Diversion
Several days of travel passed, uneventful except for Tekk harassing Nironai, and her retaliation. Silver Phoenix had gotten over her instinctive dislike of the flashy gleeman, and the two were getting along remarkably well. Thomadrili could play dice—with the less-than-obvious cheating—and tell a good war story, as well as gladly listening to the unicorn’s tall tales as well. Thomadrili was very persuasive as well. With a few innocent questions, she managed to get the story of how the blue-haired assassin had come to this world. “I had just finished up a job, and was leaving. It paid pretty well, so I was around the scene for a bit longer than usual, cleaning up. If someone’s willing to pay me a thousand credits—gold,” he amended, noticing their confused looks. “A thousand gold for a hit, I’m gonna take care of them. As I was leaving, the police came out of the woodwork. Apparently, my employer had gotten greedy. Not only would her opponent be out of the running, but her five hundred cr-gold—half of my money, paid already—would have been returned with the thirty thousand gold my head’s worth. So, when I saw the odds weren’t conducive to survival, I ran. Actually, I flew. Apparently, somewhere up in the stratosphere, there’s some sort of gate that I went through. When I landed at sunup, I didn’t see my jungle, or the city, so I kept going until I found civilization. What I found was a fairly busy city, and I found plenty of work. A pretty cool place, and a very neat system—the Game of Houses.”<br>“Nothing more than what I’d expect from an assassin, finding Cairhienin.” Silver Phoenix growled. “Ah, the Daes Dae’mar… the Great Game of Houses…” Thomadrili said with relish. “The Great Game holds sway over all the nobles in the city of Cairhienin, where every action is going to be picked apart and interpreted. Simple things like taking a walk, buying a horse, or even talking to someone are interpreted to be scheming against a rival, manipulating the lower class, or just plain trickery. Sometimes it’ll play itself out physically as well, with ambushes, raids, or assassinations. His cup of tea.”<br>Tekk grinned. “You got that right! I made a handsome profit in Cairhienin, before I had to, er, leave.”<br>“Chased out’s more like it…” Nironai muttered. “Well yeah, what else would you expect? I never left a job undone.”<br>“Damn Hunter…” Silver Phoenix muttered. Thomadrili interjected, “Isn’t that a bit harsh?”<br>“No, it’s not. Everyone knows how… distasteful an assassin’s job is, so they finally came up for a term for it. Hunter, the most insulting thing you can call a blood-money grubber.” Silver Phoenix snapped. “Don’t worry about it, Thomadrili. I’m quite used to it. Besides, she’s right.” Tekk said with a shrug. Nironai muttered something unflattering about Tekk, promising to spark another argument. “That’s enough, Nironai Sedai! I’ve had enough of you two sniping at each other to fill my bowl several times over! Just. Be. Quiet.” The unicorn Warder’s patience was legendarily short, so Tekk and Nironai settled on glaring at each other around Silver Phoenix. After their midday meal, the group moved out again, still heading southwest. Silver Phoenix began to feel a pounding headache growing, which she stolidly tried to ignore. Nironai was even more short-tempered than usual, her Warder’s mood rubbing off. Tekk was moving through the trees with his usual silence, wary, as though he sensed something. Thomadrili was exceptionally quiet, picking up on something she didn’t much like. Silently, the group agreed something was wrong. “Trollocs.” Nironai said suddenly. Silver Phoenix raised her muzzle to the wind, and then quickly dropped it, wrinkling her nose at a foul odor. “At least a fist, and a couple of Myddraal too, from what I can smell.” She snorted the scent from her muzzle. “Alamarn curse them,” she muttered, invoking the dark god of the unicorns. “They can sense Shadowspawn,” Thomadrili whispered to Tekk in response to his confused look. “Nironai’s from the Borderlands, and they’re taught to hunt and kill the Dark One’s creatures from the cradle. Warders can generally sense Shadowspawn too, and from what I’ve heard, the war unicorns are similar to the Borderlanders.”<br>“Ah, I see. I think. So, what’re we going to about them?” Tekk asked, for once being sensible. “We’ll see which way the wind blows,” Silver Phoenix said enigmatically. The group continued onward, silently. Trollocs were fierce foes, and an entire fist—at least a hundred, with one or more Myddraal in command—was more than most fighters could or cared to handle. Avoidance was a good tactic, even when you had an Aes Sedai and a Warder traveling with you. However, the Myddraal in control of the Trollocs weren’t about to let their prey go. “They’re following us,” Nironai said in a matter-of-fact tone. “They’re going to be on us like a ton of bricks…” Silver Phoenix muttered. “Always a ray of sunshine, you are.” Tekk commented. The unicorn silenced him with a look. “Here they come!” Thomadrili yelled.
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Post by Kitsun on Dec 8, 2003 2:49:03 GMT
The greenery spewed nearly a score of Trollocs. Close to ten feet tall, they were an ugly, muscle-bound mix of human and animal, most noticeably goat, boars, wildcats, and eagles. Incredibly difficult to kill, they weren’t the most intelligent of Shadowspawn, but they were persistent, often presenting their Myddraal masters some difficulty controlling them. However, in this case, what the Trollocs wanted to do, the Myddraal let them—kill everything. Silver Phoenix bellowed a warcry, charging the Trollocs with horn at ready. Thomadrili’s hands were full of vicious throwing knives, which she was using with deadly accuracy, taking down one Trolloc with each blade. Nironai wielded the One Power against the Shadowspawn, summoning a quarterstaff of Air to be her weapon. Tekk had a thin, light sword with one edge, a katana, and it was apparent he knew full well how to use it. The Warder was using her advantage of size and weight over the Trollocs to gore them with her heavy horn, often closing in to rip their flesh with her fangs. Her hooves were formidable weapons, being the size of plates, and as heavy as a blacksmith’s hammer. Even a glancing blow from one of the four hooves sent the largest Trolloc reeling, often dispatched by one of the other three. Pounding skulls with her quarterstaff of Air, Nironai called on deadly weaves, sending fireballs or lightning strikes at the Trollocs, with devastating effects. Her aim was nearly perfect, and often the backlash from the weave killed others, making the weaves highly effective, even if they missed. Thomadrili was a curious sight in the battle. Her gaudy gleeman’s cloak made her easy to spot, but her knives were accounting for a great deal of damage in the fist of Trollocs. Even though she was in the thick of things, her cloak—she proudly boasted it belonged to her grandfather—remained spotless. Tekk was a killer. His brute strength and swordplay were flawless, tuned by years of fighting. Two of the Trollocs cornered him, but he showed no signs of fear. In fact, he never showed any emotion when he fought. His expression was blank, unfeeling, even as his slender katana removed Trolloc heads. Eventually, the Trollocs was decimated, but there had been no sign of the Myddraal that all knew were guiding the fist. Thomadrili retrieved her knives from the Trolloc bodies, Tekk wiped his sword off, whistling tunelessly, and Silver Phoenix spat Trolloc blood from her mouth with a disgusted look. Tekk looked up and around, and finally asked, “Where’s the Aes Sedai?”<br>Silver Phoenix’s head shot up into the air, looking around urgently. “She’s not here… Where the hell is she?”<br>“You mean the Hunter had something right?” he asked innocently. “Be quiet, you!” she snapped. “I don’t know where she is. All I can tell is she’s not conscious.”<br>Thomadrili waved from ten feet away. “Here, I think I found something! Look, Trolloc tracks, and if I’m not mistaken, Nironai drag-marks. Here’s our answer: Nironai was captured by Trollocs!”<br>“Well don’t sound so happy about it, gleeman!” Silver Phoenix snarled. “I’m not; I’m just pointing out what happened.” Thomadrili said benignly. “Well, we need to regroup before we can do anything. Tekk, where—bloody Light, he’s gone!”
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Post by Largo LeGrande on Dec 8, 2003 8:41:41 GMT
OoOoOoO Cool:)
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Post by Kitsun on Dec 12, 2003 22:33:15 GMT
Chapter Three Trolloc Stew
Tekk hurried through the treetops, easily following the Trollocs’ trail. He was quick and silent, hardly moving the trees as he passed. The Trollocs had a head start, but he was faster, and he wasn’t dragging along a struggling Borderland woman. Thanks to his speed, Tekk could soon smell thick smoke, the kind that forever hung over Trolloc camps. From his vantage point, the assassin could see several captives, tied to posts in various parts of the camp. Most had the look of Midlanders, local villagers, but there was one or two who were obviously foreigners. Nironai was tied to a heavy pole, guarded by two Myddraal, showing she was dangerous. From the way head lolled, Tekk correctly guessed she was unconscious. Myddraal were dangerous foes, some of the most deadly Shadowspawn ever created. They serve the Dark One loyally, and answered only to him. They were cunning and dangerous, having incredible skill with their blades, as well as the intelligence to know when and where to use them. In combat, they often single out the strongest foe, and eliminate him or her at once. Myddraal were generally in control of Trollocs, and knew how to use that army to the best advantage of the Dark, though they cared nothing for the lives of the creatures under their command. The second Myddraal had brought a quarter of a fist—about twenty Trollocs—with it. Counting the Trollocs, Tekk concluded that there were about thirty of them all together, but soon to become less. Rival bands didn’t work well together, and the two Myddraal were in command of two such groups. Currently, they were warring over which band got the captives, doing an excellent job of wiping one another out. Not being the concern of the Myddraal, they didn’t order their respective bands into order, keeping their focus on Nironai. Tekk slipped closer to the Myddraal, using the confusion of the Trollocs to cover what little noise he made. He’d had the misfortune to encounter Myddraal before, and, while they’d been an interesting opponent, he didn’t care for their blades, poisoned like all Shadowspawn. The assassin let a maniac grin spread across his face. If the Trollocs were going to wipe each other out, he was going to help. Pulling out a set of throwing stars, he threw them expertly into the thick of the fighting. Each of the Shadowspawn that were struck went down within the minute. Tekk was an expert, leaving nothing to chance—the stars were poisoned. The Trollocs were now utterly disorganized, killing even members of their own fist. Though the Myddraal clearly didn’t want to leave Nironai unguarded—even unconscious—they had to take the Trollocs in hand. As soon as the Myddraal were occupied by their underlings, Tekk darted to Nironai, carefully cutting the cords that bound her to the pole. However, his luck ran out. A Trolloc had seen him, and attracted the Myddraal’s attention to him. “Oh, wonderful…” the assassin muttered. “Perfect. Just what I needed.” Raising his voice to normal volume, Tekk asked, “I don’t suppose you’d just let me go… with her, of course.” In response, the Myddraal drew its black sword. “I really didn’t think you’d see it my way… but there’s no harm in asking.” he grumbled, drawing his own sword.
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Post by Kitsun on Dec 12, 2003 22:34:11 GMT
Since most of the Trollocs were dead, the second Myddraal joined in the battle. Tekk had no time to do anything but block and dodge the poisoned blades. Fortunately for him, he was fast enough to be able to handle both Myddraal at once, a feat not many people could manage without the aid of channeling. The warrior’s expression of utter concentration faded from his face, and the emotionless look took its place. Quite suddenly, it was as though there as a different person fighting the Myddraal. There might as well have been several feet of space between Tekk’s flesh and the Myddraal’s blades the way he moved, and not one touched him. Somewhere in the back of his mind, Tekk could hear Nironai stirring from unconsciousness, and knew she was staring at the battle between the Myddraal and himself. No human should have been able to survive a joint attack by Myddraal, and Tekk was doing so. From her curses, he was able to guess that the feeling was coming back into her limbs after being untied. He could also hear her scrambling to get out of the fight, to a location where she could help, if she had the strength to. The assassin and the Shadowspawn attacked back and forth, the Myddraal taking the wounds, despite their black plate armor. The head of one Myddraal went flying, Tekk’s sword a blur in the air. The second Myddraal, showing more admirable self-preservation instincts, used its ability to vanish into shadows and reappear out of a different shadow elsewhere to escape Tekk. Letting the blade dangle from his hand, he looked around, seeing if there were any more foes to be dealt with before he attended to Nironai. There were none. The remaining Trollocs had fled, leaving the camp in ruins, filled with the dead. The other captives had fled, or been killed, Tekk didn’t know or care. At last, he turned to Nironai. Nironai’s wrists and ankles were raw from the rough ropes binding her to the pole, as well as a large lump on the back of her head, but otherwise, she was uninjured. She was staring at him, green eyes wide in shock. “Are you alright?” he asked, wiping the blood from his sword. “No human can do that!” she finally said. Tekk shrugged. “I’ve fought Myddraal before. They’re no big deal, as long as you can keep out of the way of their swords.”<br>“But what about the fear they make people feel? Doesn’t that affect you?”<br>“I don’t feel pain, and I surely don’t feel fear. It’s a bunch of human baggage I don’t have the ability to sense.” he said absently. “If you can’t feel human emotions, then you can’t be human.”<br>“No,” he said pleasantly, “I’m not.”<br>“Then what are you?” Nironai demanded, not understanding. He tapped the metal on his cheek with his metal-covered hand. “I’m half man, half cyborg—machine. I was designed to be a killing machine, before They realized that the surgery that made me this hadn’t made me lose my free will.” He shrugged again. “I’m rather used to it, and like it.”<br>Nironai stared at Tekk, mixed feelings showing on her face. She couldn’t decide if she pitied him, scorned him, or just wanted to fry him with a Lighting weave—once she was rested enough to channel. “Anyhow, we’d better go off and find Silver Phoenix and Thomadrili,” he said cheerfully, picking Nironai up to carry her. “What do you think you’re doing?! Put me down!” she howled. “You can’t walk, and don’t tell me you can. I want to find them sometime this year, not in the next ten or so.” With that, the assassin calmly started walking back the way he had come, easily carrying a kicking, cursing Nironai.
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Post by Largo LeGrande on Dec 12, 2003 22:56:25 GMT
This is really good.
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Post by Rimmer on Dec 13, 2003 4:35:19 GMT
Hey I'm sick and in a pissy mood. And you're still entertaining me. It speaks of your brilliance. Keep going.
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Post by Ebony on Dec 13, 2003 19:06:42 GMT
Well, this is just... neat!
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Post by Wen Mernde on Dec 15, 2003 4:58:23 GMT
*applauds. then sets up tent and waits for more of the story*
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