Ely edit Sep 12 2024:
1-6 qps, depending on length and quality.
Potential +1 qp: if part of a series: o
Total: 2 qps
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Gansea was afraid. The dim light barely cut through the thick haze in her mind, casting long shadows that seemed to twist and writhe with her fear. She acknowledged several truths through the fog, the first of which was most dire: she was bound and incapacitated beyond hope. The villagers had put something potent in her tea—forkroot was the obvious guess. The other truths gnawed at her: she should never have left Tear, should never have joined the Tower, should never have taken the Oaths.
She glanced over at her companion of years and choked back a sob. Beneath the torn, ragged, and shifting cloak, the hulking mass of her Warder lay unmoving. But she did not need that stillness to know Liero was dead. She had sensed his absence hours ago. It was what had caused her to lose her sense, and she was just now recovering.
The man in the white cloak stepped into the dim light from a recess in the shadows where she had not noticed him standing. He slowly walked over to her, glancing down with an eerie calmness. He knelt on one knee, directly into the drying pool of Liero’s blood. He reached over and lifted her chin, forcing her eyes to meet his. She looked deep into those eyes, and what she saw scared her. Where she expected zeal and madness, she saw nothing but cold, hard eyes of the deepest brown, almost black. His breathing was calm as he spoke.
"I'd like to share a revelation that I've had during my time observing the world.” He paused, standing once he was sure she had the strength to keep her head up. He turned away, still speaking to her.
“It came to me when I tried to classify your kind, and I realized that you are not like ordinary people.” He paused next to a table adorned with her belongings: her shawl, her ring, and the so-called angreal she had been tasked with returning to the Tower. The whole reason she had come to this Light-forsaken village. It had been bait. How could she have been so stupid? How had the eyes and ears failed her so badly?
“You see, every person in this world instinctively seeks harmony with the Light and the Pattern, but you channelers do not.” He suddenly turned back and quickly knelt beside her, his hand once again under her chin. With his other hand, he wiped the sweat off her brow and looked at it with disdain.
“You draw upon the One Power, and you weave, and weave until every shred of balance is consumed. The only way you can maintain your influence is to impose your will upon others.” Through her heart-stopping panic, she looked closer into his eyes and finally saw it hidden in those depths. The zeal. Gansea, a minor Tairen noble turned Aes Sedai, was as good as dead, and she knew it. But… she had to keep him talking. She tried to speak to prompt him, but realized she was unable to say anything through her swollen mouth. It was not necessary; the Child of Light went on.
“There is another force in this world that behaves in a similar way. Do you know what it is?” He looked at her expectantly and then seemed to realize she was unable to speak at all. That was when Gansea felt it, the faintest of sparks. The forkroot was wearing off. The Child went on.
“The Shadow. Channelers of the One Power, and particularly you Aes Sedai, are a blight, a scourge upon the Pattern.”
He got up once again and turned back to the table. In that moment, Gansea felt a small sliver of the One Power flow back into her, and she began weaving, a small, weak, faint spark forming in front of her-- her hands were tied, but she did not strictly need them and… and she noticed the Child had already turned back around and was observing her, a small smile playing across his face. He had a small knife in his right hand.
He knew. He had wanted this. He had wanted her to reach out for the One Power’s embrace one last time. The vile poison was not wearing off; he had simply lowered the dose. This was absolution for him. The realization hit her, and she drained of all hope, releasing the Power for the last time.
“You are a plague, and we are the cure."
The knife flew.
**
Patter Reilly, Child of Light, looked on as the plumes of flame rose to the sky, burning away the dilapidated barn and all that was inside, save the lapdog's body. As tainted as he must have been, he had been a Borderlander by the look of it. Patter had done the empty husk of the man the small service of burying him, returning him for the last embrace, so important to his people. Patter could not know how much of the man's actions were of his own volition. The witch, however, would be scattered ash carried away by the smoke by morning.
Perhaps he would return to Amador now. It had been a long tour of duty and he had saved his fellow Children marshalling in camps around the Caralain Grass one less Sedai to deal with. And in the process, perhaps he had found a new calling.