Many of the living he passed sat on the ground in the rare spots where there were no corpses and no blood. These men did not look like the victors of a battle, though the arrival of the Asha’man had saved this day. The trick with the lava had given Elayne’s army the breather it needed to regroup and attack.
That battle had been swift, but brutal. Trollocs did not surrender, and they couldn’t be allowed to break and flee. So Galad and the others had fought, bled and died long past when it was obvious they would be victorious.
The Trollocs were dead now. The remaining men sat and stared out at the blanket of corpses, as if numbed by the prospect of searching out the few living among the many thousands dead.
The setting sun and choking clouds made the light red, and gave faces a bloody cast.
Galad eventually reached the long hill that had marked the division between the two battlefields. He climbed it, slowly, forcing down thoughts of how good a bed would feel. Or a pallet on the floor. Or some flat rock in an out-of-the-way place, where he could roll up in his cloak.
The fresher air atop the hill shocked him. He’d been smelling blood and death for so long that now it was the clean air that smelled wrong. He shook his head, walking past tired Borderlanders who were trudging through gateways. The Asha’man had gone to hold off the Trollocs to the north so Lord Mandragoran’s armies could escape.
From what Galad heard, the Borderlander armies were a fraction of what they had been. The betrayal of the great captains had been felt most deeply by Lord Mandragoran and his men. It sickened Galad, for this battle had not gone easily for him or anyone else with Elayne. It had been horrible— and as bad as it had been, the fight had gone more poorly for the Borderlanders.
Galad kept his stomach settled with difficulty as his view from atop the hill let him see just how many carrion birds had come to feast. The Dark Ones minions fell, and the Dark One’s minions glutted themselves.
Galad eventually found Elayne. Her passionate words, being spoken to Tam al’Thor and Arganda, took him by surprise.
“Mat is right,” she said. “The Field of Merrilor is a good battlefield. Light! I wish we could give the people more time to rest. We’ll have only a few days, a week at most, before the Trollocs reach Merrilor behind us.” She shook her head. “We should have seen those Sharans coming. When the deck starts to look like it’s stacked against the Dark One, of course he will just add a few new cards to the game.”
Galad’s pride demanded that he remain standing as he listened to Elayne talk to the other commanders. For once, however, his pride lost out, and he settled down on a stool and slumped forward.
“Galad,” Elayne said, “you really should allow one of the Asha’man to wash away your fatigue. Your insistence upon treating them like outcasts is foolish.”
Galad straightened up. “It has nothing to do with the Asha’man,” he snapped. Too argumentative. He was tired. “This fatigue reminds me of what we lost today. It is an exhaustion my men must endure, and so I will, lest I forget just how tired they are and push them too far.”
Elayne frowned at him. He had stopped worrying that his words offended her long ago. It seemed he couldn’t claim that a day was pleasant or his tea warm without her taking offense somehow.
It would have been nice if Aybara hadn’t run off. That man was a leader—one of the few that Galad had ever met—that one could actually talk to without worrying that he’d take offense. Perhaps the Two Rivers would be a good place for the Whitecloaks to settle.
Of course, there was something of a history of bad blood between them. He could work on that . . .
I called them Whitecloaks, he thought to himself a moment later. Inside my head, that’s how I thought of the Children just now. It had been a long time since he’d done that by accident.
“Your Majesty,” Arganda said. He stood beside Logain, the leader of the Asha’man, and Havien Nurelle, the new commander of the Winged Guard. Talmanes of the Band of the Red Hand trudged up with a few commanders from the Saldaeans and the Legion of the Dragon. Elder Haman of the Ogier sat on the ground a short distance away; he stared off, toward the sunset, seeming dazed.
“Your Majesty,” Arganda continued, “I realize you consider this a great victory—”
“It is a great victory,” Elayne said. “We must persuade the men to see it that way. Not eight hours ago, I assumed that our entire army would be slaughtered. We won.”
“At a cost of half of our troops,” Arganda said softly.
“I will count that a victory,” Elayne insisted. “We were expecting complete destruction.”
“The only victor today is the butcher,” Nurelle said softly. He looked haunted.
“No,” Tam al’Thor said, “she’s right. The troops have to understand what their losses earned. We must treat this as a victory. It must be recorded that way in the histories, and the soldiers must be convinced to see it so.”
“That is a lie,” Galad found himself saying.
“It is not,” al’Thor said. “We lost many friends today. Light, but we all did. Focusing on death, however, is what the Dark One wants us to do. I dare you to tell me I’m wrong. We must look and see Light, not Shadow, or we’ll all be pulled under.”
“By winning here,” Elayne said, deliberately emphasizing the word, “we earn a reprieve. We can gather at Merrilor, entrench there, and make our last stand in our strength against the Shadow.”
“Light,” Talmanes whispered. “We’re going to go through this again, aren’t we?”
“Yes,” Elayne said reluctantly.
Galad looked out over the fields of the dead, then shivered. “Merrilor will be worse. Light help us . . . it’s going to get worse.”
CHAPTER 33
The Prince’s Tabac
Perrin chased Slayer through the skies.
He leaped from a churning, silver-black cloud, Slayer a blur before him in the charred sky. The air pulsed with the rhythm of lightning bolts and furious winds. Scent after scent assailed Perrin, with no logic behind them. Mud in Tear. A burning pie. Rotting garbage. A death-lily flower.
Slayer landed on the cloud ahead and shifted, turning around in an eye-blink, bow drawn. The arrow loosed so quickly the air cracked, but Perrin managed to slap it down with his hammer. He landed on the same thunder-head as Slayer, imagining footing beneath him, and the vapors of the storm cloud became solid.
Perrin charged forward through a churning dark gray fog, the top layer of the cloud, and attacked. They clashed, Slayer summoning a shield and sword. Perrin's hammer beat a rhythm against that shield, pounding alongside the booming of thunder. A crash with each blow.
Slayer spun away to flee, but Perrin managed to snatch the edge of his cloak. As Slayer attempted to shift away, Perrin imagined them staying put. He knew they would. It was not a possibility, it was.
They both fuzzed for a moment, then returned to the cloud. Slayer growled, then swept his sword backward, shearing off the tip of his cloak and freeing himself. He turned to face Perrin, stalking to the side, sword held in wary hands. The cloud trembled beneath them, and a flash of phantom lightning lit the misty vapor at their feet.
“You become increasingly annoying, wolf pup,” Slayer said.
“You’ve never fought a wolf that can fight you back,” Perrin said. “You’ve killed them from afar. The slaughter was easy. Now you’ve tried to hunt a prey who has teeth, Slayer.”
Slayer snorted. “You’re like a boy with his father’s sword. Dangerous, but completely unaware of why, or how to use your weapons.”
“We’ll see who—” Perrin began, but Slayer lunged, sword out. Perrin braced himself, imagining the sword growing dull, the air becoming thick to slow it, his skin turning hard enough to turn the weapon aside.
A second later, Perrin found himself tumbling through the air.
Fool! he thought. He’d focused so much on the attack that he hadn’t been ready when Slayer changed their footing. Perrin passed through the rumbling clou
d, breaking out into the sky below, wind tugging at his clothing. He prepared himself, waiting for the hail of arrows to follow him down out of the cloud. Slayer could be so predictable . . .
No arrows came. Perrin fell for a few moments, then cursed and twisted to see a storm of arrows shooting up from the ground below. He shifted seconds before they passed through where he’d been.
Perrin appeared in the air a hundred feet to the side, still falling. He didn’t bother to slow himself; he hit the ground, increasing his body’s strength to deal with the shock of the blow. The ground cracked. A ring of dust blew out from him.
The storm was far worse than it had been. The ground here—they were in the south, somewhere, with overgrown brush and tangled vines growing up the sides of the trees—was pocked and torn. Lightning lashed repeatedly, so frequent that he could hardly count to three without seeing a bolt.
There was no rain, but the landscape crumbled. Entire hills would suddenly disintegrate. The one just to Perrin’s left dissolved like an enormous pile of dust, a trail of dirt and sand streaking out into the wind.
Perrin leaped through the debris-laden sky, hunting Slayer. Had the man shifted back up to Shayol Ghul? No. Two more arrows pierced the sky, heading for Perrin. Slayer was very good at making them ignore the wind.
Perrin slapped the arrows aside and hurled himself in Slayer’s direction. He spotted the man on a peak of rock, ground crumbling to either side of him and whipping into the air.
Perrin came down with hammer swinging. Slayer shifted away, of course, and the hammer struck stone with a sound like thunder. Perrin growled. Slayer was too quick!
Perrin was fast, too. Sooner or later, one of them would slip. One slip would be enough.
He caught sight of Slayer bounding away, and followed. When Perrin jumped off the next hilltop, the stones shattered behind him, rising up into the wind. The Pattern was weakening. Beyond that, his will was much stronger now that he was here in the flesh. He no longer had to worry about entering the dream too strongly and losing himself. He had entered it as strongly as one could.
And so, when Perrin moved, the landscape shuddered around him. The next leap showed him sea ahead. They had traveled much farther to the south than Perrin had realized. Were they in Illian? Tear?
Slayer hit the beach, where water crashed against rocks; the sand—if there had been any—had been blown away. The land seemed to be returning to a primal state, grass ripped free, soil eroded, leaving only stone and crashing waves.
Perrin landed beside Slayer. For once, there was no shifting. Both men were intent on the fight, the swings of hammer and sword. Metal clanged against metal.
Perrin nearly landed a hit, his hammer brushing Slayer’s clothing. He heard a curse, but the next moment, Slayer was rounding from his dodge with a large axe in hand. Perrin braced himself and took it on the side, hardening his skin.
The axe didn’t draw blood, not with Perrin braced as he was, but it did carry a huge amount of force behind it. The blow tossed Perrin out over the sea.
Slayer appeared above him a second later, plunging down with that axe. Perrin caught it on his hammer as he fell, but the force of the blow flung him downward, toward the ocean.
He commanded the water to recede. It rushed away, churning and bubbling, as if pursued by a powerful wind. Perrin righted himself as he fell, landing and cracking the still-wet, rocky bottom of the bay. Seawater rose high to either side of him, a circular wall some thirty feet high.
Slayer crashed down nearby. The man was panting from the exertion of their fight. Good. Perrin’s own fatigue manifested as a deep burning in his muscles.
“I’m glad you were there,” Slayer said, raising his sword to his shoulder, his shield vanishing. “I had so hoped that, when I appeared to kill the Dragon, you would interfere.”
“What are you, Luc?” Perrin asked, wary, shifting to the side, keeping opposite Slayer in the circle of stone with walls of sea. “What are you really?”
Slayer prowled to the side, talking—Perrin knew—to lull his prey. “I’ve seen him, you know,” Slayer said softly. “The Dark One, the Great Lord as some would call him. Both terms are gross, almost insulting, understatements.”
“Do you really think he’ll reward you?” Perrin spat. “How can you not realize that once you’ve done what he wishes of you, he’ll just discard you, as he has so many?”
Slayer laughed. “Did he discard the Forsaken, when they failed and were imprisoned with him in the Bore? He could have slaughtered them all and kept their souls in eternal torment. Did he?”
Perrin didn’t reply.
“The Dark One does not discard useful tools,” Slayer said. “Fail him, and he may exact punishment, but he never discards. He’s like a goodwife, with her balls of tangled yarn and broken teakettles hidden away in the bottoms of baskets, waiting for the right moment to return them to usefulness. That is where you’re wrong, Aybara. A mere human might kill a tool who succeeds, fearing that the tool will threaten him. That is not the Dark One’s way. He will reward me.”
Perrin opened his mouth to reply, and Slayer shifted right in front of him to attack, thinking him distracted. Perrin vanished and Slayer struck only air. The man spun about, sword splitting the air, but Perrin had shifted to the opposite side. Small sea creatures with many arms undulated near his feet, confused at the sudden lack of water. Something large and dark swam through the shadowy water behind Slayer.
“You never answered my question,” Perrin said. “What are you?”
“I’m bold,” Slayer said, striding forward. “And I’m tired of being afraid. In this life, there are predators and there are prey. Often, the predators themselves become food for someone else. The only way to survive is to move up the chain, become the hunter.”
“That’s why you kill wolves?”
Slayer smiled a dangerous smile, his face in shadows. With the storm clouds above and the high walls of water, it was dim here at the bottom— though the strange light of the wolf dream pierced this place, if in a muted way.
“Wolves and men are the finest hunters in this world,” Slayer said softly. “Kill them, and you elevate yourself above them. Not all of us had the privilege of growing up in a comfortable home with a warm hearth and laughing siblings.”
Perrin and Slayer rounded one another, shadows blending, lightning blasts above shimmering through the water.
“If you knew my life,” Slayer said, “you’d howl. The hopelessness, the agony ... I soon found my way. My power. In this place, I am a king.”
He leaped across the space, his form a blur. Perrin prepared to swing, but Slayer didn’t draw his sword. He crashed into Perrin, throwing them both into the wall of water. The sea churned and bubbled around them.
Darkness. Perrin created light, somehow making the rocks at his feet glow. Slayer had hold of his cloak with one hand and was swinging at him in the dark water, his sword trailing bubbles but moving as quickly as in the air. Perrin yelled, bubbles coming from his mouth. He tried to block, but his arms moved lethargically.
In that frozen moment, Perrin tried to imagine the water not impeding him, but his mind rejected that thought. It wasn’t natural. It couldn’t be.
In desperation, Slayer’s sword nearly close enough to bite, Perrin froze the water solid around both of them. Doing so nearly crushed him, but it held Slayer still for a precarious moment while Perrin oriented himself. He made his cloak vanish so he wouldn’t take Slayer with him, then shifted away.
Perrin landed on the rocky beach beside a steep hillside that was half broken away by the power of the sea. He fell on hands and knees, gasping. Water streamed from his beard. His mind felt . . . numb. He had trouble thinking the water away from him to dry himself.
What’s happening? he thought, trembling. Around him, the storm raged, the bark ripping from tree trunks, their limbs already stripped away. He was just so . . . tired. Exhausted. How long had it been since he slept? Weeks had passed in the real world, but
it couldn’t actually have been weeks here, could it? It—
The sea boiled, churning. Perrin turned. He’d kept his hammer, somehow, and he raised it to face Slayer.
The waters continued to move, but nothing came from them. Suddenly, behind him, the hill split in half. Perrin felt something heavy hit him in the shoulder, like a punch. He fell to his knees, twisting to see the hillside broken in two, Slayer standing on the other side, nocking another arrow to his bow.
Perrin shifted, desperate, pain belatedly flaring up his side and across his body.
“All I’m saying is that battles are being fought,” Mandevwin said, “and we are not there.”
“Battles are always being fought somewhere,” Vanin replied, leaning back against the wall outside a warehouse in Tar Valon. Faile listened to them with half an ear. “We’ve fought our share of them. All I’m saying is that I’m pleased to avoid this particular one.”
“People are dying,” Mandevwin said, disapproving. “This is not simply a battle, Vanin. It is Tarmon Gai’don itself!”
“Which means nobody is paying us,” Vanin said.
Mandevwin sputtered, “Paying ... to fight the Last Battle . . . You knave! This battle means life itself.”
Faile smiled as she looked over the supply ledgers. The two Redarms idled by the doorway as servants wearing the Flame of Tar Valon loaded Faile’s caravan. Behind them, the White Tower rose over the city.
At first, she had been annoyed by the banter, but the way Vanin poked at the other man reminded her of Gilber, one of her father’s quartermasters back in Saldaea.
“Now, Mandevwin,” Vanin said, “you hardly sound like a mercenary at all! What if Lord Mat heard you?”
“Lord Mat will fight,” said Mandevwin.
“When he has to,” Vanin said. “We don’t have to. Look, these supplies are important, right? And someone has to guard them, right? Here we are.”
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