The last, named by all three just before him, had been Chel Vanin, an Andoran who had lived in Maerone but ranged wide on both sides of the Erinin. Vanin could steal a hen pheasant’s eggs without disturbing her on the nest, though it was unlikely he would fail to put her in the sack too. Vanin could steal a horse out from under a nobleman without the nobleman knowing it for two days. Or so his recommenders claimed in tones of awe. With a gap-toothed smile and a look of utter innocence on his round face, Vanin had protested he was a stableman and sometime farrier, when he could find work. But he would take the job for four times the Band’s normal pay. So far, he had been more than worth it.
Sitting his dun in front of Mat on that hilltop, Vanin looked disturbed. He approved of Mat not wanting to be called "my Lord," since he did much like bowing to anyone, but he managed to knuckle his forehead casually in a rough sort of salute. "I think you got to see this. I don’t know what to make of it myself. You got to look for yourself."
"Wait here," Mat told the others, and to Vanin, "Show me."
It was not a long ride, just over the next two hills and up a winding stream with wide borders of dried mud. The smell announced what Vanin wanted him to see before the first vultures waddled into the air. The others just flapped a few paces before settling again, darting featherless heads and squawking challenges. Worst were those that never looked up from their dinners, milling piles of stained black feathers.
An overturned wagon like a little house on wheels, virulently painted in green and blue and yellow, identified the scene as a Tinker caravan, but few of the wagons had escaped burning. Bodies lay everywhere in bright clothes torn and darkened with dried blood, men and women and children. A part of Mat analyzed it coldly; the rest of him wanted to vomit, or run, anything but sit there on Pips. The attackers had come from the west first. Most of the men and older boys lay there, mingled with what was left of a number of large dogs, as if they had tried to form a line, to hold back killers with their bodies while the women and children ran. A futile flight. Heaped corpses showed where they had run headlong into the second attack. Only the vultures moved now.
Vanin spat disgustedly through a gap in his teeth. "You chase them off before they steal too much — they’ll snap up children if you don’t look sharp; raise them as their own — maybe you add a kick to speed them, but you don’t do this. Who would?"
"I don’t know. Brigands." The horses were all gone. But brigands wanted to steal, not kill, and no Tinker would resist if you stole his last penny and his coat to boot. Mat forced his hands to ease their grip on his reins. There was nowhere to look without seeing a dead woman, a dead child. Whoever did this had not wanted any survivors. He rode a slow circuit around the site, trying to ignore the vultures that hissed and flared their wings when he passed — the ground was too dry to hold tracks well, although he thought horses had gone in several directions — and came back to Vanin. "You could have told me about it. I don’t need to see." Light, but I don’t!
"I could’ve told you there was no good tracks," Vanin said, turning his horse to wade the shallow stream. "Maybe you need to see this."
Fire had taken most of the wagon lying on its side, but the wagon bed survived, propped on yellow wheels with red spokes. A man in a coat that still showed a little eye-wrenching blue lay hard against it, one sprawled hand black with blood. What he had written in shaky letters stood out darker than the wood of the wagon bottom.
TELL THE DRAGON REBORN
Tell him what? Mat thought. That somebody had killed a whole caravan of Tinkers? Or had the man died before he could write whatever it was? It would not have been the first time Tinkers had come onto important information. In a story he would have lived just long enough to scrawl the vital bit that meant victory. Well, whatever the message, nobody was ever going to know a word more now.
"You were right, Vanin." Mat hesitated. Tell the Dragon Reborn what? No reason to start any more rumors than they already had. "See the rest of this wagon burns before you leave. And if anybody asks, there was nothing here but a lot of dead men." And women, and children.
Vanin nodded. "Filthy savages," he muttered, and spat through his teeth again. "Could have been some of them, I suppose."
That band of Aielmen had caught up, three or four hundred strong. They trotted down the slope and crossed the stream no more than fifty paces from the wagons. A number raised a hand in greeting; Mat did not recognize them, but a good many Aiel had heard of Rand al’Thor’s friend, he who wore the hat and whom it was better not to gamble against. Across the stream and up the next slope, and all those bodies might as well not have existed.
Bloody Aiel, Mat thought. He knew that Aiel avoided Tinkers, ignored them, if not why, but this… "I don’t think so," he said. "See it burns, Vanin."
Talmanes and the other two were right where he had left them, of course. When Mat told them what lay ahead, and that burial parties had to be told off, they nodded grimly, Daerid muttering a disbelieving, "Tinkers?"
"We will camp here," Mat added.
He expected some comment — there was light left for a few more miles, and these three had gotten caught up in how far the Band could move in a day to the point of laying wagers — but Nalesean just said, "I’ll send a man down to signal the ships before they get too far ahead."
Maybe they felt the way he did. Unless they swung all the way over to the river, there would be no avoiding at least the sight of vultures scattering into the sky from the burial parties. Just because a man had seen death did not mean he had to enjoy it. For Mat’s part, he thought another look at those birds would empty his stomach. In the morning there would only be graves, safely out of eyeshot.
The memory would not go out of his head, though, even after his tent was raised on that very hilltop where it might catch a breeze off the river if one ever decided to rise. Bodies hacked by killers, ravaged by vultures. Worse than the battle around Cairhien against the Shaido. Maidens had died there, but he had not seen any, and there had been no children. A Tinker would not fight even to defend his life. Nobody killed the Traveling People. He picked at his beef and beans, and retired to his tent as soon as he could. Even Nalesean did not want to talk, and Talmanes looked tighter than ever.
Word of the killing had spread. There was a quiet over the camp Mat had heard before. Usually the darkness would be broken by at least a little raucous laughter and sometimes songs off-key and off-color until the bannermen drove the handful who would not admit they were tired to their blankets. Tonight was like the times they had found a village with the dead unburied or a group of refugees who had tried to keep their little from bandits. Few could laugh or sing after that, and those who could were usually silenced by the rest.
Mat lay smoking his pipe while darkness fell, but the tent was close, and sleep would not come for memories of Tinker dead, older memories of older dead. Too many battles, and too many dead. He fingered his spear, traced the inscription in the Old Tongue along the black shaft.
Thus is our treaty written; thus is agreement made. Thought is the arrow of time; memory never fades. What was asked is given; the price is paid.
He had gotten the worst of that deal.
After a time he gathered a blanket, and after a moment the spear, and padded outside in his smallclothes, the silver foxhead on his bare chest catching the light of the clipped moon. There was a slight breeze, a meager stirring with little coolness that scarcely shifted the Red Hand banner on its staff stuck in the ground before his tent, yet better than inside.
Tossing his blanket down among the scrub, he lay on his back. When he was a boy, he’d sometimes used to put himself to sleep naming the constellations. In that cloudless sky, the moon gave enough light to wash out most stars even if it was waning, but it left enough. There was the Haywain, high overhead, and the Five Sisters, and the Three Geese pointing the way north. The Archer, the Plowman, the Blacksmith, the Snake. Aiel called that one the Dragon. The Shield, that some called Hawkwing’s Shield — that
made him shift; in some of his memories he did not like Artur Paendrag Tanreall at all — the Stag, and the Ram. The Cup, and the Traveler with her staff standing out sharp.
Something caught his ear, he was not sure what. If the night had not been so still, the faint sound might not have seemed furtive, but it was and it did. Who would be sneaking around up here? Curious, he lifted up on an elbow — and froze.
Like moonshadows, shapes moved around his tent. Moonlight caught one enough for him to make out a veiled face. Aiel? What under the Light? Silently they surrounded the tent, closed in; bright metal flashed in the night, whispers of cloth being sliced, and they vanished inside. A moment only and they were back out. And looking around; there was light enough to see that.
Mat gathered his feet under him. If he kept low, he might be able to slip away without being heard.
"Mat?" Talmanes called up the hillside; he sounded drunk.
Mat went still; maybe the man would go back if he thought he was asleep. The Aiel seemed to melt away, but he was sure they had gone to ground where they were.
Talmanes’ boots crunched closer. "I have some brandy here, Mat. I think you should take it. It is very good for dreams, Mat. You do not remember them."
Mat wondered whether the Aiel would hear him over Talmanes if he went now. Ten paces or so to where the nearest men would be sleeping — the First Banner of Horse, Talmanes’ Thunderbolts, had the "honor" tonight — less than ten to his tent, and the Aiel. They were fast, but with a step or two, they should not catch him before he had fifty men almost within arm’s reach.
"Mat? I do not believe you are asleep, Mat. I saw your face. It is better once you kill the dreams. Believe me, I know."
Mat crouched, clutching his spear and taking a deep breath. Two strides.
"Mat?" Talmanes was nearer. The idiot was going to step on an Aiel any time now. They would cut his throat without making a sound.
Burn you, Mat thought. All I needed was two strides. "Out swords!" he shouted, leaping upright. "Aiel in the camp!" He sprinted down the slope. "Rally to the banner! Rally to the Red Hand! Rally, you dog-riding grave-robbers!"
That woke everyone, of course, as well it should with him bellowing like a bull in briars. Shouts spread in every direction; drums began beating assembly, trumpets sounding rally. Men of the First Horse roared out of their blankets, racing toward the banner waving swords.
Still, the fact was, the Aiel had a shorter distance to run than the soldiers. And they knew what they were after. Something — instinct, his luck, being ta’veren; Mat certainly did not hear anything over the racket — made him turn just as the first veiled shape appeared behind as if springing out of the air. No time to think. He blocked the thrust of a stabbing spear with the haft of his spear, but the Aiel caught his return slash on a buckler and kicked him in the belly. Desperation gave Mat strength to keep his legs straight with no air in his lungs; he twisted aside frantically from a spearhead that sliced his ribs, clipped the Aiel’s legs out from under him with his own spear haft, and stabbed him through the heart. Light, but he hoped it was a him.
He jerked the spear free just in time to face the onslaught. I should have run when I first had the bloody chance! He worked the thing like a quarterstaff as fast as he ever had in his life, spinning, blocking away lancing Aiel spearpoints, no time to strike back. Too many. I should have kept my bloody mouth shut and run! He found breath again. "Rally, you pigeon-gutted sheep-stealers! Are you all deaf? Clean out your ears and rally!"
Wondering why he was not dead yet — he had been lucky with one Aiel, but nobody had enough luck to face this — he suddenly realized he was no longer alone. A skinny Cairhienin in his smallclothes fell nearly under his feet with a shrill yell, only to be replaced by a Tairen with his shirt flapping and sword swinging. More crowded in, shouting everything from "Lord Matrim and victory!" to "The Red Hand!" to "Kill the black-eyed vermin!"
Mat slipped back and left them to it. The general who leads in the front of battle is a fool. That came from one of those old memories, a quote from somebody whose name was not part of the memory. A man could get killed in there. That was pure Mat Cauthon.
In the end, it was a sheer matter of numbers. A dozen Aiel and, if not the whole Band, several hundred who managed to reach the hilltop before it was done. Twelve Aiel dead and, because they were Aiel, half again as many of the Band, with twice that or more bleeding if still alive to groan while they were tended. Even with his brief exposure, Mat stung and bled at half a dozen places, at least three of which he suspected would need stitching.
His spear made a good walking staff as he limped around to where Talmanes was stretched out on the ground with Daerid tying a tourniquet around his left leg.
Talmanes’ white shirt, hanging loose, glistened darkly in two places. "It seems," he panted, "Nerim will get to try his hand as a seamstress on me again, burn him for a ham-fisted bull." Nerim was his serving man, and mended his master as often as his master’s clothes.
"Will he be all right?" Mat asked softly.
Daerid shrugged. He wore only his breeches. "He is bleeding less than you, I think." He glanced up. He would have a new scar to add to the collection on his face. "As well you got out of their way, Mat: It is clear they were after you."
"Good not to give them what they came for." Wincing, Talmanes struggled to his feet with the aid of an arm over Daerid’s shoulder. "It would be a shame to lose the Band’s luck to a handful of savages in the night."
Mat cleared his throat. "That’s the way it seemed to me, too." The image of the Aiel vanishing into his tent welled up in his mind, and he shivered. Why under the Light would Aiel want to kill him?
Nalesean appeared from where the dead Aiel were laid out in a row. Even now he had his coat on, though not buttoned; he kept frowning at a bloodstain on the lapel, maybe his blood, maybe not. "Burn my soul, I knew those savages would turn on us sooner or later. I expect they came from that lot who passed us earlier."
"I doubt it," Mat said. "If they had wanted me, they could have had me spitted and over the fire for dinner before any of you knew it." He made himself hobble over and study the Aiel, taking a lantern someone had brought to aid the moonlight. The relief of finding only men’s faces nearly unhinged his knees. He did not know any of them, but then, he did not really know many Aiel. "Shaido, I expect," he said, returning to the others with the lantern. They could be Shaido. They could be Darkfriends; he knew all too well that there were Darkfriends among the Aiel. And Darkfriends, of course, did have reason to want him dead.
"Tomorrow," Daerid said, "I think we should try to find one of those Aes Sedai across the river. Talmanes here will live unless all the brandy leaked out of him, but some of the others might not be so fortunate." Nalesean said nothing, but his grunt spoke volumes; he was Tairen, after all, with less love than Mat for Aes Sedai.
Mat did not hesitate in agreeing. He would not be letting any Aes Sedai channel at him — in a way, every scar marked a small victory, another time he had avoided Aes Sedai — but he could not ask a man to die. Then he told them what else he wanted.
"A ditch?" Talmanes said in tones of disbelief.
"All the way around the camp?" Nalesean’s pointed beard quivered. "Every night?"
"And a palisade?" Daerid exclaimed. Glancing around, he lowered his voice. There were still quite a few soldiers about, hauling away the dead. "There will be a mutiny, Mat."
"No there won’t," Mat said. "By morning, every last man will know Aiel sneaked through the whole camp to reach my tent. Half won’t sleep for thinking they will wake with an Aiel spear in their ribs. You three make sure they understand the fact that a palisade just might keep Aiel from sneaking in again." At the least it would slow them down. "Now go away and let me get a little sleep tonight."
After they had gone, he studied his tent. Long slashes in the walls, where Aiel had gone in, stirred in the fitful breeze. Sighing, he started to return to his blanket in the scrub, then hesitated. Th
at noise that had alerted him. The Aiel had not made another, not a whisper. A shadow made as much noise as an Aiel. So what had it been?
Leaning on his spear, he limped around the tent, studying the ground. He was not sure what he was looking for. Soft Aiel boots had left no marks that he could make out by lantern light. Two of the tent ropes hung where they had been cut, but… He set the lantern down and fingered the ropes. That sound could have been taut rope being sliced, yet there was no reason to cut these to get inside. Something about the angle of the cuts, the way they lined up with one another, caught his attention. Taking up the lantern, he cast around. A wiry bush not far away had been trimmed along one side, thin branches with small leaves lying on the ground. A very neat trimming, perfectly flat, the severed branch ends smooth as though planed by a cabinetmaker.
The hair on the back of Mat’s neck stirred. One of those holes in the air that Rand used had been opened here. Bad enough that Aiel had tried to kill him, but they had been sent by somebody who could make one of those… gateways, Rand called them. Light, if he was not safe from the Forsaken with the Band around him, where was he safe? He wondered how he was going to sleep from now on with watch fires around his tent. And guards; a guard of honor, he could call it to take some of the sting away, to stand sentry around his tent. Next time it would probably be a hundred Trollocs, or a thousand, instead of a handful of Aiel. Or was he important enough for that? If they decided he was too important, the next time it could be one of the Forsaken. Blood and ashes! He had never asked to be ta’veren, never asked to be tied to the Dragon Bloody Reborn.
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