The next morning, Aran faced a challenge that a decade of combat training had not prepared him for: he had no idea how to ride a horse.
In his era, humanity travelled in hovering jo-cars and sub-orbital sho-wings. Animals were wildlife, not transportation or at best one of the hobbies. But he was playing the part of a highborn lord, and a lord could not walk while common soldiers rode.
He met Kael at the village stables just as the frost was beginning to melt. The woodcutter, deeply indebted and fiercely determined to outfit his savior properly, had paraded nearly every horse in Vaelen into the muddy yard.
"Too small," Kael muttered, dismissing a sturdy brown mare. "Too narrow in the chest. That one looks like its knees would buckle under the weight of your sword, my Lord."
Aran stood on the edge of the muck, hands clasped behind his back, trying to look discerning while internally trying to figure out which end of the beast the steering apparatus went on.
Captain Varek, leaning against the stable fence with a cup of hot Kaf in his armoured gauntlet, was watching the display with unconcealed amusement.
"A true lord of Maram Kashor should have an eye for horseflesh," Varek noted dryly, taking a sip. "Unless your father entirely neglected the saddle while he was teaching you how to swing that blade?"
"My father believed in mastering one's own two feet before trusting the four of a beast, Captain," Aran replied smoothly, though the lie was wearing thin on his patience.
"Ah, this is the one," Kael announced triumphantly, leading a massive, deep-chested mountain gelding out of the largest stall. It was a magnificent animal, pitch-black with a thick mane, standing tall enough to match Aran's imposing stature perfectly. "Cost me a fair bit of silver, but he's got the stamina to carry you to Imfaral and back."
But as Aran stepped forward, the gelding baulked. It didn't panic or rear, but its hooves shifted nervously in the freezing mud, pulling the reins taut in Kael's grip. The beast pinned its ears back and let out a low, anxious snort, leaning as far away from Aran as the leather would allow, its dark eyes wide with a primal, unmistakable wariness. Aran paused, a slight frown touching his features. He couldn't quite understand the creature's intense reaction. Did the animal somehow sense the dormant, deadly matrix of the Atherion at his hip, or was it reacting to some lingering, unnatural stillness from his long centuries in stasis? Whatever it was sensing, the horse clearly wanted nothing to do with him.
Varek snorted into his tea, clearly preparing to watch the arrogant noble get kicked into the mud. "Mountain bred. They spook easily, Aren. Shall I have one of my men hold him down so you can mount?"
Aran didn't blink. "That won't be necessary."
He reached into his long coat, his fingers brushing past the a well and crystal photographs, and closed around a familiar object. He had found the Pendant of Taming buried in the robes of a dead Darkfriend scout during the bloody, final days of his own age. At first glance, it was a beautiful thing—a delicate, leaf-shaped piece of metal cradling a vibrant green crystal, intricately wrapped in what looked like living vines. Resting in his palm, it still pulsed with a faint, warm heartbeat whenever creatures of the forest drew near.
Keeping his hand inside his coat, Aran slipped the pendant into his palm and pressed his thumb against the activation matrix. He didn't need to channel; the ter'angreal hummed to life, projecting a localized field of intense neurological tranquillity.
Aran stepped confidently into the striking range of the flailing beast and placed his bare hand flat against the gelding's lathered neck.
Instantly, the horse froze. The panic melted from its eyes, replaced by a glassy, utter adoration. Its breathing slowed to a deep, contented rumble, and its knees actually buckled slightly before it leaned its massive, heavy head directly onto Aran's shoulder, nudging his neck with docile affection.
Captain Varek lowered his teacup, staring at the beast in blank disbelief. Kael, picking himself up from the mud, blinked in astonishment.
"Blood and ashes..." Kael breathed. "I've never seen a beast break that fast."
"He just needed to know who was leading," Aran lied smoothly, giving the captain a mild, aristocratic smirk. Varek merely grunted, turning on his heel and marching back toward his soldiers, severely disappointed that the entertainment had concluded.
Over the next hour, safely behind the cover of Kael's forge, the woodcutter gave the ancient man a frantic, whispered crash course in saddles, stirrups, and reins. Aran's genetically optimized reflexes and perfect balance allowed him to mimic the mechanics quickly. He sat straight and tall in the saddle, though internally, he found the bouncing, swaying gait of the animal to be a horribly primitive and highly inefficient mode of transport.
As he was adjusting the leather stirrups, Miri ran up from the yard, wielding a perfectly straight stick. She slashed the air with a clumsy, two-handed swing, nearly taking out a chicken.
"Aran! Teach me how to chop monsters!" she demanded, her eyes shining with hero-worship.
Aran smiled, a rare expression that softened his sharp features. He looked down from his towering, magically tranquillized horse to Kael, who was watching his daughter fondly. Aran swung down from the saddle and knelt to Miri's eye level.
"A sword is a heavy burden, Miri. And I am only a wanderer," Aran said gently. "But you have a fierce protector right here." He gestured to Kael. "When you are old enough to lift a real blade without threatening the village poultry, your father will teach you exactly how to defend your home."
Miri looked at Kael, whose chest swelled with immense pride, and she dropped her stick, running to hug her father's soot-stained leg.
For the next ten days, the village of Vaelen existed in a state of suspended dread, waiting for the Imperial reinforcements.
Aran spent his time mingling with the villagers, projecting the image of an aloof but polite member of the so-called blood. However, his true focus was always on the inn. He deliberately kept his distance from Sul'dam Lystra and her damane, Myli, but his eyes were always watching.
He wanted to see the a'dam up close. To study the silver collar and the matching bracelet whenever Lystra walked through the square. If he could just get his hands on it for a few hours, he could reverse-engineer the matrix. He could figure out how to break it or at least figure out its inner workings.
While they waited, Captain Varek did not sit idle. He enlisted Vaelen's master tracker, an older hunter named Roul, to lead the scouting party into the deep woods. Aran, riding his magically pacified gelding, accompanied Varek and three of his armoured scouts.
They spent two days quietly mapping the churned earth, broken underbrush, and massive claw marks on the trees, pressing deeper into the wilderness than the village loggers ever dared. Finally, on the seventh day of tracking, the trail led them out of the dense forest and into the jagged, rocky foothills of the Aldeal Mountains.
Roul held up a fist, dropping to his stomach on a high ridge overlooking a steep-walled box canyon. Aran and Varek crawled up beside him, peering through the dense ferns.
What they saw below was not the camp of a lone thief. It was a heavily fortified military installation.
The mouth of the canyon had been blocked off by a crude but effective palisade of sharpened iron-root logs. High up on the rocky ledges, sentries armed with heavy crossbows walked methodical patrol routes, scanning the tree line.
Inside the canyon, an illicit breeding operation was in full swing.
Aran studied the layout with the clinical, calculating eye of a High Age tactician. There were at least two dozen men in the camp, wearing the tattered, stripped remnants of Seanchan Imperial armour—deserters, operating as a rogue mercenary cell.
But it was the beasts that made Captain Varek let out a slow, hissed breath.
There wasn't just one pack of grolm. There were three distinct packs, segregated into heavy timber pens. Among them paced a massive anomaly: a female grolm significantly larger than the rest, her hide a mottled, sickly pale grey. She possessed a horrifying, heavily scarred intelligence in her three unblinking eyes, acting as an alpha to the younger beasts.
Worse still, grolm were not the only nightmares these traitors had stolen. Chained to heavy iron stakes near the canyon wall were two corlm—swift, flightless avian predators built to run down horses and snap cavalrymen in half. Deep in the shadows of the cave system at the back of the canyon, Aran could hear the low, earth-shaking rumble of something even larger.
"Blood of the Empress," Varek whispered venomously, his hand tightening on his sword hilt. "This isn't a rogue handler. This is a splinter cell. They've been stealing breeding stock from the Imfaral pens for years, building a rogue exotic company."
"They have chosen their ground well," Aran noted smoothly, analyzing the choke points. "sky is without a good view, The canyon walls are too steep to scale quietly. The palisade funnels any frontal assault into a kill zone. If you charge that gate, they will unleash the beasts to break your infantry, while the crossbowmen on the ledges pin you down."
Varek looked at the pale-coated noble with a newfound flicker of military respect. "You have an eye for siege warfare, Lord Valeris. You are right. This canyon is a natural fortress. Standard infantry will be slaughtered here."
Varek began to slide backwards off the ridge, his faceplate locked onto the traitor's camp. "We fall back. When the raken reaches Imfaral with my report, the High Lord will not send a mere patrol to deal with an army of stolen beasts. He will send a hammer."
But for now, he merely observed.
Aran stood on the porch of the inn, the Atherion resting lightly at his hip. The wait was over. The trap was set. It was time to see exactly how the Empire waged war, and to watch the horrifying mechanics of the a'dam in action.
But Aran was a scholar and tactician who understood that a battle won effortlessly by the Empire yielded him no advantage. If this High Lord Turon's overwhelming force crushed the rebels instantly, Aran would learn nothing of the collar's limits, nor would he find an opening to acquire one. He needed chaos. He needed attrition. He needed both sides to bleed.
That night, while the Imperial infantry slept in the local inn and the sul'dam rested in her own room, Aran vanished into the deep woods.
Moving with the flawless, silent grace of a Seeker, he bypassed the rebel sentries along the canyon ridges. He slipped like a shadow into the heart of the traitor's camp. He found the master of the operation—a heavily scarred, grizzled deserter—poring over maps in a canvas tent.
Aran did not draw his blade. He remained cloaked in the heavy shadows at the edge of the tent, his face entirely hidden by the high collar of his coat and the darkness.
"If you wish to live through tomorrow, listen closely," Aran's voice drifted from the dark, cold and disembodied.
The rebel master snatched a dagger from the table, spinning around. "Who's there? Show yourself!"
"I am a ghost who wishes to see the Empire bleed," Aran replied , his voice coming from everywhere "And you are out of time. A full Imperial hunting cadence marches on this canyon at dawn. Fifty heavy infantry, torms, and three damane. If you try to hold the palisade, you will burn. Draw them into the canyon. Rig the cliffs. Use your beasts as a Spear, not a shield."
Before the rebel leader could call his guards, Aran melted back into the night. He had balanced the scales. Now, he would watch them break.