|
ALTARAN [SETTING: Ishamael's office as Acting CEO of the Darkfriends, in the absence of the Chairman of the Board, Mister Great Lord of the Dark himself! (His friends call him "Great Lord" for short). Or at least, this is the T'A'R manifestation of that office, since Ishy is still bound in the flesh for the time being.] [There is the sound of a skirmish outside in the reception area, but Ishamael doesn't seem to notice. He's leaning back in his swivel chair, feet up on his desk, crooning softly one of his favorite old songs from the Age of Legends. Even Ishy gets nostalgic for his carefree youth from time to time, y'know?] ISHAMAEL [singing softly]: Well she got her daddy's car and she cruised through the ter'angreal stand now / Seems she forgot all about the Sharom like she told her old man now / And with the callbox blastin' goes cruisin' just as fast as she can now / And she'll have fun, fun, fun till her daddy takes the jo-car away! SFX: CRASH! [SFX is scripting jargon for Sound Effects, or I think it is :) ] [The Aiel Darkfriend (okay, okay, I have previously conceded that her name is Melindhra) and the Ebou Dar Station Chief Darkfriend have just tumbled through the door, shattering it to pieces and passing right through without either of them being particularly hurt - something which is a heck of a lot easier in T'A'R, where if you really WANT that door to give away as soon as you crash into it, it probably will! Most James Bond films probably occur in T'A'R, given his uncanny ability to run right through a hail of automatic weapons fire (AK-47s and the like) on his way through an enemy stronghold, without his even being scratched! Oh dear, am I digressing again? Maybe if I hurry back to the story nobody will notice! Worth a try!] [I should probably mention at this point that the Altaran character is female, about 30 years old, wearing a black dress with an oval cutout in the neckline, revealing part of her bosom. She had a black veil over her face originally - rather resembling that worn by Melindhra in her role as a Maiden of the Spear - but it's been ripped off in the fracas and Melindhra will now know "Altaran" if they ever come face to face again.] ISHAMAEL: WHAT'S ALL THIS? [He gestures, and suddenly Altaran and Melindhra are standing rigidly, tied up in bonds of air, side by side, facing his desk without being able to move any muscles below their collarbones]. Mel - [catches himself. No need to give away one high- ranking Darkfriends' real name to another!] - AHEM! [clears throat]. Had a frog in my throat for a moment. "Maiden!" I'll hear your side first. I thought I sent you back home to your dreams in the Three-Fold land after our interview an hour ago? MELINDHRA: Not exactly, Great Lord! If you will recall, as you waved me out you instructed me to send in the Cairhienin Station Chief next. No Cairhienin was visible in the lobby, so I waited for him to show up so that I could comply with your order before leaving - and also so that I could give him a scar or two for inconveniencing Your Malevolence by not being where he was supposed to be, when he was supposed to be there! [She tries to look as virtuous as possible, if that's the right word for a Darkfriend who wants to show her evil fervor in performing her duties]. [NOTE: If you aren't inclined to take her word for it about Ishy's boner in his last instructions to her, check the transcript of that interview for yourself, at http://www.oocities.org/Area51/Corridor/1815/wot/reviewdark.html#AIEL] ISHAMAEL [thinking to himself, silently]: Hmmm . . . that was the interview right before Barthanes came in . . . oh, that's right! Barthanes keeps strange hours - seems to be insomniac, in fact - and I wasn't sure he'd be asleep naturally at the precise time I wanted to talk to him (my calendar is SO crowded these days!), so I had sent him a message to take a sleeping potion that would knock him straight into dreamland at such-and-such a time. When he passed out, my mental summons immediately scooped him up and brought him right into my office instead of just guiding him to my lobby, since I was ready to see him right away! And I forgot Melindhra was standing outside waiting to show him in. Oops! Let's see, on the one hand I could ADMIT I made an error . . . but on the other hand . . . ISHAMAEL: Good thinking, Melindhra, but I fear the Cairhienin has not even fallen asleep yet. Apparently he has chosen to defy me, but the matter will be dealt with in my own fashion. MELINDHRA [sneering under her veil]: Well, what ELSE can one except from a mere treekiller? Loyalty? HA! ISHAMAEL: I'll get back to you in a minute, Maiden. [Glancing at Altaran]: Okay, now let's hear from you, briefly. What happened when you arrived? ALTARAN: Great Lord! I was summoned to your reception room tonight, and was told by one your servants to enter this office at a certain time! When I tried to do so, this savage tried to STOP me from following orders! Naturally I went for my knife, since she was evidently challenging me to a duel - MAIDEN [blankly]: Duel? One duels with fellow WARRIORS, not with soft, weak wetlander women who have to half-expose themselves in public in order to win the approval of the men who run everything in the wetlands - ALTARAN [looking shocked, then amused]: Is THAT the way you think it works west of the Dragonwall? Let me tell you something about the facts of life, you nincompoop! When I wear a dress like this, it's so that - MAIDEN [growling]: "Nincompoop?" I suppose I COULD make an exception and duel with you after all if you REALLY want it that way! I don't suppose you know the way of the spear, but I'll gladly face your silly knife, or even two knives at once, with nothing but my bare hands in order to give you at least one chance in a hundred of SURVIVING - ISHAMAEL: ENOUGH! [Fires shoot forth several inches from what an optimist would call his "eyes" and "mouth"]. It was all a lamentable misunderstanding, triggered by that pesky Cairhienin's failure to appear on time! Not in any way MY fault, of course, as my written report shall make clear if the Great Lord of the Dark himself ever inquires into the matter, but I would prefer that it be forgotten as quickly as possible. It's highly unlikely that you two will EVER meet again, in the flesh or in T'A'R, so forget it already! [He snaps his fingers and Melindhra disappears, her mind being zapped back to her own body somewhere in the Waste. Altaran suddenly finds her arms and legs free to move again as Ishy releases the weaves of Air.] ALTARAN: Thank you, Great Lord. Please tell me one thing, as a personal favor? ISHAMAEL [eyeing her warily]: Let me hear it, and I'll decide if you deserve to know the answer. ALTARAN: Do we REALLY need to keep around those argumentative Aiel around AFTER Tarmon Gai'don? I appreciate that they are very dangerous warriors and it would be a great coup if we could somehow convince them that one of us was their long-awaited Messiah figure, so that their clans would hit the armies of the Light from the east at the same time the Trolloc hordes were sweeping down out of the north, but shouldn't we arrange to, ahem, dispose of them AFTER the Last Battle? They're such a bloodthirsty, stiff-necked, inflexible, trigger-happy breed that they might refuse to meekly accept the Great Lord of the Dark's supremacy and his right to give orders to everyone! ISHAMAEL [seems to mutter something, very softly, about the pot calling the kettle black, then replies more audibly]: Fear not! One of their own prophecies states that only "a remnant of a remnant" of their people shall survive the battles which will soon be upon us, and if we assume that means "a third of a third" then no more than one ninth of their peak population will still be around after Tarmon Gai'don. Probably a lot less! ALTARAN [relieved]: Thank you for your indulgence in answering my query, Great Lord! ISHAMAEL [sourly]: I'm just too soft-hearted and tolerant for my own good. Ask anyone who knows me! (The handful of survivors, at least!) ALTARAN: And now, what did you have to ask of me? ISHAMAEL [searching his memory for a moment]: Oh yes . . . well, I wondered if duels were still the favorite sport of the Altaran people, but I think we've already settleded that when you were arguing with the Aiel Maiden . . . Your people are even more obsessed with such things than the Cairhienin, which takes some doing. Do all Altaran women still wear those, ah, interesting necklines? Narrow but plunging V-shapes, or else oval cutouts? ALTARAN: Yes, Great Lord! The theory is that the marriage knife (once a girl has married) should stay right next to her skin for some reason or other, instead of being separated from it by a layer or two of cloth. And since it traditionally goes over the middle of the chest, dress styles must needs reveal a bit more of that area of a woman's anatomy than some cultures would consider "decent." ISHAMAEL: Ah yes, that's right! That was the way I planned it, several centuries ago, when I decided to experiment with making Altaran women VENERATE their personal daggers and study hard to learn how to use them on people! I assume that men are often distracted by the spectacle of a woman's dagger (not to mention the, er, immediate background against which it is resting) to the extent that they don't keep track of other things as much as they should? ALTARAN [thoughtfully]: Well, natives of Ebou Dar and other Altaran towns get used to our dress styles and stop looking, but it's a real plus when we're dealing with outlanders. Combined with the law that any woman killing a man is PRESUMED innocent UNLESS it can be proven that she had no "good" reason to kill him, it's been a great benefit in our work! If there's some man whom the Darkfriends of nearby nations such as Murandy or Illian or Amadicia want killed, they find a way to get him to voluntarily step over the line into Altara as part of a business trip or some such, and then I (or one of my fellow assassins) arranges for a quiet conversation with him, and while he's, er, distracted, I find an opportunity to shout something like, "You FILTHY man! How dare you make such an indecent proposal?" And I grab my dagger and kill him in "self- defense!" Witnesses have to admit that he was staring at me in a very improper way, and under the law, the court has to take my word for it that he actually made some very indecent overtures unless someone can PROVE I had motive to murder him, such as being mentioned in his will! Since the men I kill are always total strangers to me, nobody can ever prove I had a secret motive! ISHAMAEL [trying hard to look modest. He doesn't do it very well, but hey, who would have the heart to tell him?]: I STILL can't believe the Altaran Lords and Ladies accepted that law when I proposed it - the idea that the woman ALWAYS gets the benefit of the doubt, even if she is KNOWN to have killed some poor male fool! After the First Oath of the Aes Sedai, that is perhaps my most brilliant achievement, even if I do say so myself! ALTARAN: Did I mention that the marriage knife is given to the bride by the groom as part of the wedding ceremony, and he must formally ask her to kill him with it if he ever displeases her? ISHAMAEL [incredulous]: NO! ALTARAN [smugly]: YES! ISHAMAEL: Good grief, I missed a lot during my last couple of naps! How did the men ever agree to THAT kind of rule? ALTARAN: It was my great-great-grandmother's idea, actually. I'm not sure how she made it work, perhaps by appealing to the masculine pride of all the men in her neighborhood of Ebou Dar, saying, "Aren't you BRAVE enough to risk fighting your own wife if anything goes wrong? Aren't you STRONG enough? Aren't you SMART enough to treat her as a woman DESERVES to be treated?" ISHAMAEL: Ah yes, it's marvelous the way the Macho Instinct can completely override the brain cells in the male of the species . . . sometimes I allow myself to forget that (I being, of course, too wise and experienced to ever fall into such a trap). So what you're saying is . . . ALTARAN: YES! If a female Darkfriend marries a non-Darkfriend, and he eventually uncovers proof that she is involved with some sort of conspiracy (though he may not understand exactly what) she can simply kill him and announce that he offended her! Keeps security risks to a MINIMUM! ISHAMAEL: I never dreamed we could get THAT institutionalized in your culture! Good work on your family's part! Anything else I should know? ALTARAN: Well, there still isn't a central government worthy of the name. If it ever becomes likely to happen, we start assassinating enough important people to stir up trouble again! The current Queen inherited from her father, but he took the throne the HARD way, and I wouldn't be surprised if the same thing happens all over again after Tylin dies, since her only surviving child, Beslan, is somewhat dissipated in his pursuit of wine, women, and song, as opposed to political acumen . . . ISHAMAEL: I can guess what happened to his siblings. Keep up the good work! On your way out, Lucrezia, send in the Saldean representative, would you? [Thinks about that for a minute, in the light of the Melindhra thing]. But if you don't see him right away, don't bother to linger. Just relax and go back to sleep so that you'll wake up in your own bed at home! [NOTE: Yes, I had to invent a name for the Altaran Darkfriend, since I don't think we know any such character by name.] |