Copy Protection Void Part 5 (Patreon)

Mist glanced at the white haired gleeman when he sat down at his table. "Morning."

"How are you doing?" Thom asked, curious about the young man that hadn't shed any tears for his father that he'd seen.

Mist glanced toward the kitchen where he could hear Egwene's mother rattling around, trying to get an early start for the Bel Tine celebrations. "I keep telling myself that it could have been worse, my father died a hero and I didn't much like the other two."

"Does it help?" Thom asked.

Mist sighed. "I'm not at the bottom of a bottle so ya, I'll call that a win."

"What about the peddler?" Thom asked.

Mist glanced around to make sure no one was close enough to hear. "He had smiles for the people willing to spend coins and glares for the people that didn't have any coins or that didn't spend them on his crap, at least when the adults weren't watching. He wasn't as good at hiding it as he liked to think or maybe he just didn't care. I doubt his guards were any better and they ran off right before the attack, like they knew it was coming."

"They might have heard something," Thom offered.

"I'd expect a merchant to run for the inn, not into the forest or at least scream if there was something wrong. Maybe I'm jumping at shadows but I've never liked the guy and we got attacked by monsters," Mist replied as Egwene's clone walked down the stairs wearing Egwene's second best dress and the boots that he'd had conjured for her. "How did you sleep?"

"Egwene hogs the blankets," the clone replied as she walked over.

"What's your world like?" Thom asked, having heard some of the townsfolk mention Egwene's twin that they hadn't known existed which gave a certain amount of credence to her claims to be from somewhere else.

"Everything matched up before the trollocs showed up," the clone replied as she sat down next to Mist. "At least as far as Egwene and I could tell."

Thom glanced between the two teenagers then looked over at the dark haired youth that had just walked through the door. "How long do you think you'll have before the Tower sends a group of Aes Sedai to collect the girls?"

"Anywhere from a couple of months if we're unlucky and someone mentions something they shouldn't to the merchants or the guards that show up for the wool in the spring to a couple of years if we're lucky. I'm hoping to have enough people trained that they won't be able to force the issue when they eventually find us."

"Did you manage to convince your parents that you need to leave?" Mist asked Mat as he walked over, trying to change the subject away from Aes Sedai.

"They weren't particularly happy about it but they agreed that it was my choice," Mat replied as he sat down across from Egwene's clone.

"Getting involved with Aes Sedai never ends well," Thom warned them as the girl's twin walked down the stairs followed by a young man with dark red hair that stood out from the rest of the villagers as he was a head taller than most of them.

"I'm aware," Mat replied, thinking about all of the trouble various Aes Sedai had caused him over the years.

Mist turned to look at Egwene and Rand as they walked over. "Any nightmares filled with monsters?"

"Not that I recall," Rand replied as he walked over, keeping his voice down so he wouldn't wake up anyone that was sleeping upstairs.

Egwene glanced at Thom then sat down next to her clone, finding it a bit depressing that he didn't know her and knowing that being around Elayne would be worse. "I kept running into trollocs in the forest, we're going to have to be careful."

"Being careful sounds like a good idea but you can't let bad dreams control your life," Thom warned her as Moiraine and Lan walked down the stairs.

"I'm aware," Egwene replied as she turned to look at Moiraine. "Did you run into any trouble in the forest last night?"

"We found a few trollocs wandering around but we managed to kill them before they knew we were there," Lan replied, glad that he'd taken the villagers because they were practically ghosts and better archers than most of the professional archers he'd ever seen. "I could sense more but the middle of the night isn't a good time to hunt trollocs."

"At least we have confirmation that we need to organize hunting parties," Mat said, hoping he could convince some of the better archers and hunters to help exterminate the trollocs.

"I had a dream about Nynaeve and the crystal, you're going to want to give it to her," Egwene told Mist, wanting her friend back and someone that she could talk to about what they'd gone through that had actually lived through it.

Mist pulled the Unbroken Queen crystal out of his belt pouch and handed it to Egwene. "Best of luck."

"Thanks," Egwene replied as she put the crystal in her belt pouch.

Egwene's clone spoke up, "We're going to need to hide the school if we don't want it destroyed."

"With wards or in the mountains, underground and with a dream spike?" Mist asked, trying to figure out how thorough they needed to be.

"I don't know, I just know that if we don't hide it, it gets destroyed by black fire within a couple of months," she replied, not particularly happy with watching her friends and family die because of Ishamael.

"Black fire?" Thom asked, wondering if she had the ability to predict the future like Elaida.

"Lovely," Mist muttered, fairly sure that the only person with the ability to toss around black fire was Ishamael which was a bit of a problem because he was extremely dangerous and insane. "So much for doing things the nice way."

"What are you thinking?" Mat asked.

"I think we're going to need an edge," Mist replied as Nynaeve walked into the inn with Perrin following her. "Just the man I was looking for."

"Why?" Perrin asked as they walked over.

"Because your arms are bigger than my legs and we need to move a bunch of boxes quickly," Mist replied with a grin. "I'll even pay you."

Perrin glanced between the people at the table then focused on Mist. "What do you need moved?"

"Old boxes filled with junk and ter'angreal," Mist replied. "We're not going to have a lot of time before the gateway collapses."

"Is this a joke?" Perrin asked Egwene.

"No, we're going to need the help," Egwene told him.

"Where are you getting boxes filled with ter'angreal?" Nynaeve asked.

"In an abandoned storeroom," Egwene replied as she pulled the Unbroken Queen crystal out of her belt pouch and held it out toward Nynaeve. "If you lick the crystal, you'll understand."

Nynaeve gave Egwene a look that said she was less than impressed about the entire thing then took the crystal and licked it, causing the crystal to vanish. She blinked a couple of times when she found herself back in the inn after being away for years. "That's going to take some getting used to."

"How much do you remember?" Egwene asked.

Nynaeve glanced at Egwene then focused on Lan, finding it strange to see him with black hair rather than the white he'd had for the last couple of decades. "Everything until Lan's funeral."

"How did I die?" Lan asked, hoping that he'd died well or at least that a future version of him had.

"Old age," Nynaeve replied with a faint smile, sad at his passing but knowing that he'd lived a full life and that he'd restored his kingdom.

"Old age?" Lan asked, a bit surprised that he hadn't died fighting or from a knife in the back.

"In that version you managed to live until you were a hundred and seventeen," she told him, wishing he could remember all of the good times they'd had together and wishing she could have brought their family with her.

"A hundred and seventeen?" Lan asked in disbelief.

"Warders have increased endurance and you had an excellent healer," Nynaeve replied with a smile.

"Do you have any proof?" Thom asked, finding the entire thing a bit hard to believe.

Nynaeve turned to look at Thom. "Just memories of a life that never happened or that happened to another version of me and the skills of a lifetime spent healing. I also know that your name is Thomdril and that your nephew could channel."

"How do you know that?" Thom asked, surprised that she'd recognized him.

"You told me or a version of you told a version of me," Nynaeve replied with a sigh. "I'm still trying to wrap my head around the fact that I'm twenty eight and a hundred at the same time."

"You don't look a day over twenty," Mat teased.

"Don't start," Nynaeve told Mat.

"Can you open a gateway to the storeroom in Ebou Dar?" Egwene asked, wondering if she remembered the place well enough to open a gateway.

"I remember the place, we spent weeks searching for it because someone couldn't remember how many floors it had," Nynaeve complained.

"To be fair, that wasn't me," Egwene replied with a grin as she pulled her ring off and handed it to Nynaeve.

"You don't get to claim her accomplishments if you won't claim the rest," Nynaeve told her friend as she slipped the ring on her finger.

"Fair enough," Egwene admitted. "Don't channel around the ter'angreal or touch the sides of the gateway, they're sharper than the sharpest knife you'll ever find."

"We should probably borrow the back room," Egwene's clone suggested as she stood up.

"It would be safer," Nynaeve agreed as she walked to the room that the village council used for meetings.

"How did you rediscover gateways?" Thom asked as the group walked over to the meeting room.

"Egwene figured it out by studying the world of dreams," Nynaeve replied as she reached through the angreal and embraced the source, wanting to conserve her strength for dealing with the shadowspawn in the forest. She 'reversed' and inverted the weave so that Moiraine wouldn't be able to see the weaves or sense it, opening a gateway to the Kin's storeroom in Ebou Dar near the wall in both locations so that she wouldn't hit anything since she didn't remember the exact placement of the boxes. "Grab everything, we'll sort it when we're done."

"Let's go," Mat said as he ducked through the gateway into the dust covered room. "The longer this takes the less power she'll have to help with the trollocs."

Mist followed Mat through the gateway, hoping they could grab everything before Ishamael or one of the Kin showed up.

'That's annoying,' Moiraine thought, wishing Nynaeve hadn't inverted the weave so she could see how it was created. "How many tricks were you able to rediscover?" she asked as Rand and Perrin headed through the gate to help with the boxes.

"We picked up a couple of interesting tricks, including a couple of things that the Forsaken don't know," Egwene offered cheerfully as she followed Perrin through the gateway, thinking about the trick to unweaving a weave that she'd picked up from the Aiel.

Lan glanced at Moiraine then headed through the hole in the air, being careful not to touch the sides of the large gateway.

Egwene's clone walked into the storeroom to grab a box, feeling a touch guilty about stealing the ter'angreal but knowing the ter'angreal would go a long way toward making sure they could kill Ishamael or at least put up a fight.

"Is there a reason you inverted the weave?" Moiraine asked, wondering if she had a reason not to trust her based on the memories she received from the crystal.

"I don't want anyone to feel the weave in the city," Nynaeve replied as Thom headed through the gateway to help with the boxes. "If we're lucky, we'll be long gone by the time anyone investigates, especially if we don't drop anything and keep the noise down."

Myst spent the next couple of minutes half expecting something to go wrong as they relocated the Kin's stash of ter'angreal and angreal. "Mat, are the dice rolling?"

"No," Mat replied as he walked out with the second to last last crate. "Don't borrow trouble."

Mist dropped the note he'd written last night when he realized that he was going to have to steal the stash then picked up the last box and hustled back through the gateway, glad that he didn't have to worry about hitting his head or even coming close. "We're good."

Nynaeve carefully unwove the gateway, wanting to make sure that no one would be able to find a trace of the weave on the off chance that they investigated in the next couple of days. She let go of the power then turned her attention to the collection of boxes scattered around the meeting room. "At least it should be easier the second time."

Egwene's clone pulled her attention away from the space where the gateway was and looked at Mist. "Can I borrow your glasses or do you want to record everything?"

"Have fun, I just want to borrow the defensive gear so I'm not worried about getting butchered by trollocs," Mist replied as he took his sunglasses off and handed them to Egwene's clone.

"Now that we're done stealing a priceless collection, who did we steal it from?" Thom asked, unwilling to believe that someone had just forgotten about an entire collection of ter'angreal.

"People that didn't deserve the stress they're going to suffer when they realize we walked off with it," Mist admitted as Egwene's clone started sorting through the items they'd stolen. "I wrote a note explaining that an Aes Sedai took it and that a foretelling told her where to find it and that they did a good job keeping it safe until it was needed. I'm hoping that implying that the Tower doesn't actually know about them gives them some comfort."

"If they don't deserve it, why steal the stash?" Thom asked.

"The stash has or at least should have several items that we're going to need to fight the Last Battle and asking permission would cause more trouble than just swiping it and hoping we can sort things out before they notice."

"Like the Horn of Valere?" Thom asked sarcastically.

"No, that's in the Blight," Mist replied with a shrug, causing Thom to stare at him when he realized he was being serious.

Thom glanced at Moiraine then focused on Mist. "How do you know that?"

"I used a one use ter'angreal that gave me a summary of a version of the next two years, it's not completely accurate and will get less accurate the more changes we make but I know things I shouldn't," Mist explained, hoping he wasn't making a mistake by pulling Thom into things but knowing he was pretty solid in the books.

"Let me know if you find the Paralis-Net, I feel weird not wearing it," Nynaeve told Egwene's clone.

"I'll let you know, Mist isn't going to need most of the set," the clone replied as she set another ring into a pile with the rest of the communication ter'angreal she'd found.

Nynaeve turned to look at Mist. "What part of it are you keeping?"

"The bracelet that creates armor out of air," Mist replied with a smile. "I want to kill a couple of trollocs to see if I can get more crystals or something that would even the playing field and don't want to get killed. You're welcome to have it as soon as we can duplicate it."

"Thank you, I wore the jewelry for the better part of fifty years, I'm sort of attached to it," Nynaeve admitted, thinking about all of the times the set had saved her life over the years.

"I'm surprised the Tower didn't object," Moiraine mused.

"Cadsuane owed me enough to effectively give it to me and the next Amyrlin after she retired didn't have enough of a spine to demand that I hand it over, probably because Cadsuane would have come out of retirement and objected," Nynaeve explained.

"Retired?" Moiraine asked.

"The hall passed a law that basically stated that an Aes Sedai in good standing and of advanced years could give up the right to call themselves Aes Sedai and unbind themselves from the oaths so that they'd live longer," Nynaeve explained. "Cadsuane put out most of the fires the war and Elaida had caused, then she retired and vanished from the public eye."

"What did she end up doing?" Thom asked, having her a few stories about her over the years.

"She mostly poked her nose into things that needed attention and she'd turn up at the Tower now and then with some idiot that thought they could use compulsion or threaten people with the power then vanish in the confusion. I don't think anyone had enough courage to tell her to stop, especially since she never claimed to be an Aes Sedai after retiring."

"She has a certain reputation," Moiraine agreed.

Egwene's clone smiled when she moved a plate and saw the wooden box that contained the Paralis-net. She carefully extracted the jewelry box from the crate of ter'angreal and opened it, revealing the same collection that she remembered. "Did you ever find the rest of the set?" she asked as she tossed Mist the bracelet that created armor.

"Thanks," Mist replied as the clone gave Nynaeve the jewelry box. He slipped the bracelet on and smiled when a mostly translucent field covered his body, letting him know that the bracelet worked.

"No, I found a couple of ter'angreal that closed a couple of gaps in the set and talked Elayne into duplicating them but I never found anything that matched the style," Nynaeve replied as she started putting the jewelry on.

"Do you know anyone in the village with the ability to create ter'angreal?" Mist asked Nynaeve, figuring she might have kept tabs.

"Calle Coplin, Eldrin Cauthon and Egwene's sisters, Berowyn and Elisa," Nynaeve replied as she put the necklace ter'angreal on. "It's not a particularly common ability but the Two Rivers has a lot of people with a number of rare talents."

Mat smiled when he found the dull dagger buried under a carved stone doll. "This should keep the shadowspawn from noticing the person carrying it."

"Let me grab my bow and we'll get started," Mist said as he headed for the door to grab his bow, having left it by the table.

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