Paul stands after, feeling power within him, settling over the sorrow for now: still it is not over. Not even yet.
"With everything that has happened today," he says, aloud - Jaelle, he is aware, is listening, but he's speaking to himself as much as her - "there is one thing left to be done, and it is mine to do, I think."
He walks through a group of men, standing about helplessly towards the center of the plain. They part as he passes.
It is very quiet.
The last few men step aside, and Paul is facing Galadan, at the center of the circle.
"We meet for the third time," he says, "as I promised you we would."
So many people he has promised: Moiraine, Wellard, Kim, Amairgen . . .
"I told you in my own world that the third time would pay for all."
"Wolflord, I can see in any darkness you might shape and shatter any blade you could try to throw," Paul goes on.
His voice is low, but it has all the intensity in it of his own driven personality, as well as the authority granted him by the god. He is both Paul and Twiceborn in this moment, as balanced as he has ever been.
And still Galadan stands, scarred head held high and proud, light gleaming off the streak of silver in his hair.
He is silent a moment, gathering himself.
His voice, when he speaks, is nothing at all like it was the last time Paul heard it.
The weariness of centuries is on him, now, memories long-denied rising up thick and fast in the wake of his failure, in the wake of the Horn's call.
He opens his hands, fingers splayed and empty at his side.
There is, at this moment, nothing hidden in his sleeve.
"I have no blades left to throw. It might have been different had the dog not saved you on teh Tree, but I have nothing left now, Twiceborn. The long cast is over."
The Wolflord turns, then, to Ruana, one of the last of the Paraiko, that race of gentle creatures sent to their death by the work of Galadan's own mind
( ... )
"It is over. I have nothing left. If you had hopes of a confrontation, now that you have come into your power, I am sorry to disappoint you."
His voice is still so quiet, so calm. Part of him is yet hearing the sound of the Horn, ringing high and cold and so, so lost.
"I will be grateful for whatever end you make of me. As things have fallen out, it might as well have come a very long time ago."
He does not close his eyes, but behind them he sees Lisen, her fair, bright face, and the flash of her body as she flung herself down from her tower, following her beloved into death.
"I might as well have also leaped from the Tower."
So much energy, so much effort, so much blood--all wasted.
"I can grant you the ending you seek," Paul says, clearly, "and I will, if you ask me again. But hear me first, Lord of the andain."
He pauses, and when he goes on, his voice is surprisingly gentle -
- or not, perhaps, so surprisingly.
Kevin Laine, at least, might not have thought it so.
"Lisen has been dead this thousand years, but only today, when her Circlet blazed to the undoing of Maugrim, did her spirit pass to rest. So too has Amairgen's soul now been released from wandering at sea. Two sides of the triangle, Galadan. They are gone, finally, truly gone. But you live yet, and for all that you have done in bitterness and pride, you still heard the sound of Light in Owein's Horn."
He can feel the stillness, all eyes upon him. Some of them, he knows, will not believe that he is doing what he is. Some of them will blame him for it. It does not matter.
"Will you not surrender your pain, Lord of the andain? Give it over. Today has marked the very end of that old, sorrowful tale - will you not let it end? You heard the
( ... )
And so it is that something within Galadan that had long been clenched tight, holding Lisen's face ever in the forefront of his mind, loosens its hold.
It brings nothing like relief, only pain.
There is a flicker of anguish across his face, and more than that. It is an old, old pain, ancient and unspoken for all these long thousand years.
"If only she had loved me! I might have shone so bright!"
And then he covers his eyes--and his pain--with his hands, and weeps.
Weaver on the Loom, but he weeps, tears enough to flood the plain, or so it seems.
They are the first tears the Wolflord of the andain has ever shed, heavy with old regrets, bitter betrayal, and salt.
If he were not so completely himself at this moment, Twiceborn and Schafer both - if he had not come into his power, at long last, he would be disturbed by the strength of the kinship he feels to the Wolflord.
But he is, and so he understands.
Behind him, he hears Ruana of the Paraiko and Ra-Tenniel, lord of the lios alfar, raise their voices in a harmony of lament.
Jaelle rises first from the side of the dead boy.
Paul stands after, feeling power within him, settling over the sorrow for now: still it is not over. Not even yet.
"With everything that has happened today," he says, aloud - Jaelle, he is aware, is listening, but he's speaking to himself as much as her - "there is one thing left to be done, and it is mine to do, I think."
He walks through a group of men, standing about helplessly towards the center of the plain. They part as he passes.
It is very quiet.
The last few men step aside, and Paul is facing Galadan, at the center of the circle.
"We meet for the third time," he says, "as I promised you we would."
So many people he has promised: Moiraine, Wellard, Kim, Amairgen . . .
"I told you in my own world that the third time would pay for all."
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His hands, however, are tighly fisted, flexing and releasing as he watches the Lord of the Summer Tree approach.
The third time pays for all, indeed.
And Galadan's long, careful vengeance is spent, and not well.
There is nothing left.
Nothing.
And so he watches Pwyll Twiceborn, waiting for his death.
It may yet be swift.
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His voice is low, but it has all the intensity in it of his own driven personality, as well as the authority granted him by the god. He is both Paul and Twiceborn in this moment, as balanced as he has ever been.
"I think you know that this is true."
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He is silent a moment, gathering himself.
His voice, when he speaks, is nothing at all like it was the last time Paul heard it.
The weariness of centuries is on him, now, memories long-denied rising up thick and fast in the wake of his failure, in the wake of the Horn's call.
He opens his hands, fingers splayed and empty at his side.
There is, at this moment, nothing hidden in his sleeve.
"I have no blades left to throw. It might have been different had the dog not saved you on teh Tree, but I have nothing left now, Twiceborn. The long cast is over."
He is done.
It is more a relief than he might have thought.
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Still, he does not speak yet.
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He is waiting.
They are all waiting.
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He, too, is waiting.
"It is over. I have nothing left. If you had hopes of a confrontation, now that you have come into your power, I am sorry to disappoint you."
His voice is still so quiet, so calm. Part of him is yet hearing the sound of the Horn, ringing high and cold and so, so lost.
"I will be grateful for whatever end you make of me. As things have fallen out, it might as well have come a very long time ago."
He does not close his eyes, but behind them he sees Lisen, her fair, bright face, and the flash of her body as she flung herself down from her tower, following her beloved into death.
"I might as well have also leaped from the Tower."
So much energy, so much effort, so much blood--all wasted.
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Over and over, he has sworn: Galadan is his. One of them will die by the other's hand.
He does not look likely to die by Galadan's hand today.
And with the wings of ravens beating in his mind, he says, quiet, completely certain, "It need not be over, Galadan.
"You heard Owein's Horn. Nothing truly evil can hear the horn. Will you not let that truth lead you back?"
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Galadan yearns for why with all his soul, and yet--
And yet.
He goes white, standing stiff and straight, grey eyes gone dark with confusion and the fragile beginnings of wonder.
"I heard the horn."
His voice is harsh, now, stilted. To speak this is to expose himself, that soft core of him he thought dead so very long ago.
And yet--
"I know not why. How should I come back, Twiceborn? Where could I go?"
And beneath the bravado, beneath the weariness, there is a child's longing for place, for certainty.
For home.
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He is bright and he is magnificent, lit by the red rays of the setting sun.
And a pair of stag horns rise from his forehead.
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Father.
He does not stagger, and he does not weep.
But oh, the memories burn. And he cannot keep them at bay any longer.
None of them.
Father.
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He pauses, and when he goes on, his voice is surprisingly gentle -
- or not, perhaps, so surprisingly.
Kevin Laine, at least, might not have thought it so.
"Lisen has been dead this thousand years, but only today, when her Circlet blazed to the undoing of Maugrim, did her spirit pass to rest. So too has Amairgen's soul now been released from wandering at sea. Two sides of the triangle, Galadan. They are gone, finally, truly gone. But you live yet, and for all that you have done in bitterness and pride, you still heard the sound of Light in Owein's Horn."
He can feel the stillness, all eyes upon him. Some of them, he knows, will not believe that he is doing what he is. Some of them will blame him for it. It does not matter.
"Will you not surrender your pain, Lord of the andain? Give it over. Today has marked the very end of that old, sorrowful tale - will you not let it end? You heard the ( ... )
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It brings nothing like relief, only pain.
There is a flicker of anguish across his face, and more than that. It is an old, old pain, ancient and unspoken for all these long thousand years.
"If only she had loved me! I might have shone so bright!"
And then he covers his eyes--and his pain--with his hands, and weeps.
Weaver on the Loom, but he weeps, tears enough to flood the plain, or so it seems.
They are the first tears the Wolflord of the andain has ever shed, heavy with old regrets, bitter betrayal, and salt.
Reply
If he were not so completely himself at this moment, Twiceborn and Schafer both - if he had not come into his power, at long last, he would be disturbed by the strength of the kinship he feels to the Wolflord.
But he is, and so he understands.
Behind him, he hears Ruana of the Paraiko and Ra-Tenniel, lord of the lios alfar, raise their voices in a harmony of lament.
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