Under Guard

[Jay Carpenter]

<dl>
<dt>Asha'man Lennox Orander</dt>
<dd> </dd>
</dl>




*****Twenty-four hours later...*****

Lennox was more than displeased while he walked away from the healing house after asking the employees of the house to take care of his friend. The task took a small amount of time and effort to achieve. A sliver of Air delivered to the brain via a nostril. To someone with only the barest grasp of Healing, he knew how a simple but delicate use of Power could be more efficient than a knife in this situation. It also had the added benefit of being easy to dismiss the man's passing as an natural course of events, given the man's injuries. The Asha'man hadn't really made sure if this man was apart of the clean-up but it was best not to leave things to chance. It's the little cracks in the foundation that will collapse a wall.

He was mildly surprised though at just how easy it was for him to end a man's life on the off-chance he knew something. Taking life was something he had done time and again both as a servant of the White Tower and as a Dreadlord but never had he taken a life through an assassination. For someone who thrived in combat and often professed to much prefer honest combat, this held it's own thrill and sense of satisfaction. Having access to Saidin made such things easier, he admitted as he melded into the flow of the crowd moving towards the Inner City walls towards his next target, but still the thrill was undeniably there. While he was not a professional at this, but he knew that he would no longer balk at this type of work, and he had a feeling that if he performed well enough other missions like this would become more common for him.

The next person he was sent to silence made it more than easy to locate him. His stories were echoed in the throng of people; some confirming that the Black Tower were in fact making a power play and were beginning to show their true colors while some other defended the men in black. However, such a move was meant to be a shield. After all and overt methods of killing the fool would only verify his own story. But recent turns of events and unnatural shifts in the Pattern was happening everywhere nowadays. Stories of babies falling out of windows to live with no marks or folk dying by simply tripping over a stone in the road for example.

So Lennox waited patiently in an alley across the market area, patiently waiting for the man of Winther’s employ to come out. The sun had climbed almost to noontime before the pompous fool came out of the inn, Lennox had managed to stay out of sight and largely ignored by most during his waiting. It fascinated him how people never bothered to look around them, but this aspect of civilian life is what gave him the opportunity to seize Saidin long enough to snake a thread of Air across the square and loosen some of the roof shingles to begin a cascade of them to plunge to the ground with fatal consequences.

Lennox didn't chance being seen going over to investigate so he turned and walked out the other side of small alley and joined the flow of traffic headed to the Inner City. He had two things to accomplish there and both just happened to be at the House of Taravin. He had been able to process his own emotions long before he decided to make the journey to his deceased bondmate's grave marker. He needed some type of closure and just visiting Corele's honor marking in the White Tower had been a bit to public for him to do what he felt he had needed to be done. Unconsciously he slipped a hand into his coat pocket and idly fingered the matching ring that he wore on his own left hand before it grazed the parchment in the same pocket that caused him to realize what he was doing and remove his hand.

He stopped at an inn just inside the Inner City during lunch. Given his memories of his bondmate he assumed that her House would share her distaste at being interrupted during her meals. While such things were frequently happening to her during her life as the Keeper he did manage to catch the twinge of annoyance of when it did happen. His orders had been completed and he would soon confirm the second man's death before he left the city, but all that was left to do was to make sure that the girl, a servant as he understood it, didn't also need to be removed. The intel they had gathered suggested that she hadn't learned anything but best to make sure. Then there was the business of finally laying to rest his memories of Corele.