"How do you know he did not kill Moiraine," Bera interrupted, "as he is said to have killed Morgase?"
"We have heard every sort of rumor concerning her death," Kiruna added. "Some even say she died fighting Lanfear. Most say she was alone with al’Thor when she died."
With an effort, Merana stopped herself from answering. If she allowed those ingrained instincts a word, they would take them all in the end. "All that was in hand," she went on, "when you two arrived. Only by chance, I know, and only following your instructions to find him, yet you brought our number to thirteen. What man of al’Thor’s sort would not flee as fast as he could hearing of thirteen Aes Sedai together? The simple fact is, whatever damage has been done to our plans must be laid at your feet, Kiruna, and yours, Bera." She could only wait then. If she had managed to gain any moral ascendancy at all…
"Are you quite finished?" Bera said coolly.
Kiruna was even more blunt. She turned to the others. "Faeldrin, you will come with us to Cairhien, if you will. And you also, Masuri, Rafela."
Merana trembled, the folded letter crumpling in her fist. "Don’t you see?" she shouted. "You talk as if we can go on as before, as if nothing has changed. There is an embassy from Elaida in Cairhien, from the White Tower. That is how al’Thor must see it. We need him more than he needs us, and I fear he knows it!"
For a moment, shock covered every face save Verin’s. Verin only nodded thoughtfully, smiling a small, secretive smile. For a moment, every other face was full of wide eyes, stunned. Those words seemed to ring in the air. We need him more than he needs us. They did not need the Three Oaths to know it for truth.
Then Bera said quite firmly, "Sit down, Merana, and calm yourself." Merana was sitting before she realized it; still trembling, still wanting to shout, but sitting with her hands clutched together around al’Thor’s missive.
Kiruna turned her back deliberately. "Seonid, you will come, of course. Another pair of Gaidin are always useful. And Verin, I think." Verin nodded as if it were a request. "Demira," Kiruna went on, "I know you have grievance against him, but we do not want to panic the man again, and someone must shepherd that extraordinary collection of girls from the Two Rivers to Salidar. You, Valinde, Kairen and Berenicia must assist Merana in that."
The other four named murmured acceptance without the slightest hesitation, but Merana felt cold. The delegation was not crumbling; it was gone to dust.
"I…" She trailed off as Bera’s gaze turned’ to her, and Kiruna’s. And Masuri’s and Faeldrin’s and Rafela’s as well. Gone to dust, and all her authority with it. "You may find some need for a Gray," she said faintly. "There will certainly be negotiations, and…" Words failed her again. This would never have happened when the Tower was whole.
"Very well," Bera said at last, in such a tone that all Merana’s control only just kept her cheeks from going crimson in shame.
"Demira, you will see the girls to Salidar," Kiruna said.
Merana sat very still. She prayed that the Hall had chosen an Amyrlin by now. Someone very strong, in the Power and in her heart. It would take another Deane, another Rashima, to make them once more what they had been. She prayed Alanna led them to al’Thor before he decided to acknowledge Elaida. Even another Rashima would not save them then.
Chapter 50
(Wolf)
Thorns
Rand spent the rest of that day in his apartments in the Sun Palace, a good part lying on his bed, a huge thing with four square blackwood posts thicker than his leg, polished till they shone between the inlaid ivory wedges. As if to contrast with all the gilding in the anteroom and sitting room, the bedchamber furnishings were all blackwood and ivory, if no less angular.
Sulin rushed in and out, fluffing his feather pillows and adjusting the linen sheet over him, grumbling that blankets on the floor were healthier, bringing him mint tea he did not ask for and punch he did not want, until he ordered her to stop. "As my Lord Dragon commands," she growled through a sweet smile. She made her second perfect curtsy, but she still stalked out as though she might not bother to open the door.
Min also stayed with him, sitting on the mattress and holding his hand and frowning until he suspected she thought he was dying. Finally he chased her out too, long enough to put on a dark gray silk robe that he had always left in the wardrobe before. He found something else in there as well, way in the back. A narrow, plain wooden case holding a flute, a gift from Thom Merrilin in what seemed another lifetime. Sitting by one of the tall narrow windows, he tried playing. After so long, he produced more squeaks and silences than anything else at first. It was the odd sounds that drew Min back.
"Play for me," she said, laughing in delight, or perhaps astonishment, and of course settled herself on his knee while he tried with small success to produce something near a recognizable tune. Which was how the Wise Ones walked in on him, Amys and Bair and Sorilea and a dozen or so more. Min scrambled up quickly enough blushing at that, tugging her coat straight to such an extent you would have thought they had been wrestling.
Bair and Sorilea were at his side before he could say a word.
"Look left," Sorilea commanded, thumbing back his eyelid and thrusting her leathery face into his. "Look right."
"Your pulse is too quick," Bair muttered, holding bony fingers against the side of his throat.
It seemed that Nandera had sent a Maiden running as soon as his knees gave way. It seemed that Sorilea had winnowed the small army of Wise Ones who had intended to descend on the palace into this smaller horde. And it seemed that Sorilea or no Sorilea, everyone wanted her turn at the Car’a’carn. When she and Bair were done, her place was taken by Amys, and Bair’s by Colinda, a lean woman with penetrating gray eyes who looked short of her middle years yet had almost as strong a presence as Sorilea. But then, so did Amys, of course, and any number of them. He was poked, prodded, stared at, and called stubborn when he refused to jump up and down. They really seemed to think he would.
Min was not ignored while the Wise Ones were taking their turns with him; the others surrounded her, asking a hundred questions, all about her viewings. Which widened her eyes to say the least, and had her staring at them and Rand as if wondering whether her mind was being read. Amys and Bair explained — Melaine had not been able to keep the news of her daughters to herself — and instead of growing any wider, which they probably could not at that point, Min’s eyes looked ready to fall out of her face. Even Sorilea seemed to accept Melaine’s view that Min’s ability put her on an equal footing of sorts with them, but Wise Ones being Wise Ones — very much in the manner of Aes Sedai being Aes Sedai — she had to repeat everything nearly as many times as there were Wise Ones, because those fussing over him at any given time wanted to be sure they had not missed anything.
Once Sorilea and the rest reluctantly concluded that all he needed was rest; and departed ordering him to see that he got it, Min made herself comfortable on his lap again. "They talk in dreams?" she said, shaking her head. "It doesn’t seem possible, like something out of a story." A frown creased her forehead. "How old do you think Sorilea is? And that Colinda. I saw — No. No, it doesn’t have anything to do with you. Maybe the heat is affecting me. When I know, I always know. It must be the heat." A mischievous light appeared in her eyes, and she slowly leaned closer, pursing her lips as if for a kiss. "If you put them like this," she murmured when they were almost touching his, "it might help. There were bits in that last piece that almost sounded like ‘Rooster in the Gumtree.’" It took him a moment to understand, with her eyes filling his vision, and when he did, his face must have been a sight, because she collapsed on his chest laughing.
A note arrived from Coiren a short time later, inquiring after his health, wishing, he was not ill, and asking whether she might come to see him with two of her sisters; she offered Healing, should he desire. Lews Therin stirred as if rousing from sleep while Rand read, but his vague, discontented mumbling was hardly a patch on his rage in Caemlyn, and he seem
ed to go back to sleep when Rand put the short letter down.
It was a sharp contrast to how Merana had behaved. And a reminder that nothing happened in the Sun Palace at midday that Coiren did not know in full before sunset, if not sooner. He sent back polite thanks for her wishes, and a polite refusal. Out of bed or not, he still felt tired, and he wanted his wits about him when he faced any Aes Sedai. That was part of it.
In that same return note Rand also asked Gawyn to visit. He had only met Elayne’s brother once, but he liked the man. Gawyn never came, though, and he never replied. Sadly, Rand concluded that Gawyn believed the stories about his mother. That was hardly the sort of thing you could just ask a man to stop believing. It put him in a such a gray humor whenever he thought of it that even Min seemed to despair of cheering him; neither Perrin nor Loial would stay around him when he was like that.
Three days later another request came from Coiren, just as courteous, and a third three days after that, but he made excuses for those as well. In part that was because of Alanna. The feel of her was still distant and vague, but she was coming nearer by the hour. No surprise in that; he had been sure Merana would choose Alanna for one of the six. He had no intention of letting Alanna within a mile of him, or not within sight anyway, but he had said he would put them on an equal footing with Coiren, and he meant it. So Coiren would have to abide in patience for a little while. Besides, he was busy, one way and another.
A quick visit to the school in Barthanes’ onetime palace turned out not so quick. Idrien Tarsin was once again waiting at the door to show him all sorts of inventions and discoveries, often incomprehensible, and also the shops where various new plows and harrows and reapers were now being made for sale, but the difficulty was Herid Fel. Or maybe Min. Fel’s thoughts wandered as usual, his tongue wandered after them, and he plainly forgot Min was there. He forgot her a good many times. But no sooner would Rand have the man aimed at a point, than Fel suddenly noticed her for the first time again and gave a great start. He was constantly apologizing to her for the half-smoked pipe he still never seemed to remember to light, constantly brushing ash from his stout belly, constantly smoothing his thin gray hair. Min seemed to enjoy it, though why she enjoyed a man forgetting her presence, Rand could not begin to say. She even kissed Fel on top of his head when she and Rand rose to go, which left the man looking poleaxed. It did not help a great deal with learning what Fel had puzzled out about the Seals on the Dark One’s prison or the Last Battle.
The next day brought a note crammed onto a torn-off corner of parchment.
Belief and order give strength. Have to clear rubble before you can build. Will explain when see you next. Do not bring girl. Too pretty.
Fel
It was a hasty scrawl with the signature jammed into the point of the fragment, and to Rand it made no sense. When he tried to reach Fel again, though, it seemed that the man had told Idrien that he felt young again and was going fishing. In the middle of a drought. Rand wondered whether the old man’s wits had finally cracked. Min certainly found the note amusing; she asked if she could have it, and several times he caught her grinning over it.
Cracked wits or whole, Rand decided that he would leave Min behind the next time, but in truth, it was difficult to keep her at his side when he wanted her. She seemed to spend more time with the Wise Ones than with him. He could not understand why that should irritate him so, but he noticed a tendency to snap at people when Min was out among the tents. It was a good thing she was not with him too often. People would notice. People would talk, and wonder. In Cairhien, where even the servants played their own version of the Game of Houses, it could be dangerous for her to have people wondering whether she was important. A good thing. He tried not to snap.
What he wanted Min for, of course, was to view the nobles who began coming to him one at a time, asking after his health — those sagging knees must have started rumors — smiling, inquiring how long he intended to remain in Cairhien this time, what his plans were if they might ask, smiling more, always smiling. The only one who did not smile at him so intently was Dobraine, still with the front of his head shaved like a soldier and the stripes across his coat worn by the breastplate he did not wear to the palace, and Dobraine was so glum in asking exactly the same questions that Rand was almost happier to see him go than any of the others.
Min did manage to be at those audiences, squeezing it in between whatever she was doing with the Wise Ones; Rand had no intention of asking. The problem was keeping her hidden.
"I could just pretend to be your lightskirt," Min laughed. "I could drape myself on you and feed you grapes — well, raisins; I haven’t seen a grape in some time — and you could call me your little honey-lips. Nobody would wonder why I was there then."
"No," he snapped, and her face grew solemn.
"Do you really think the Forsaken would come after me just for that?"
"They might," he told her just as seriously. "A Darkfriend like Padan Fain would, if he’s still alive. I won’t risk that, Min. In any case, I won’t have these filthy-minded Cairhienin thinking of you that way, or the Tairens either." The Aiel were different; they thought her teasing very funny, very amusing indeed.
Min certainly was changeable. She went straight from solemn to radiant with no in-between, all smiles that hardly faded for a moment. Until the audiences actually began.
A paneled screen of gilded fretwork set up in the corner of the anteroom was a failure. Maringil’s dark glittering eyes avoided looking at it to such an extent that Rand knew the man would turn the Sun Palace end over end to find out who or what it hid. The sitting room turned out better, with Min peeping through cracked doors into the anteroom, but not everyone showed image or aura to her eyes during the audience with him, and what she did see, there and simply walking about in the hallways, was bleak. Maringil, white-haired and blade-slim and cool as ice, was going to die by poison. Colavaere, her more than handsome face calm and collected once she learned Aviendha was not with Rand this time, would die by hanging. Meilan, with his pointed beard and oily voice, would die by the knife. The future carried a heavy toll for the High Lords of Tear. Aracome and Maraconn and Gueyam were all going to die too, bloody deaths, in battle, Min thought. She said she had never seen death so often in one group of people.
By the time she saw blood covering Gueyam’s broad face, their fifth day in Cairhien, she felt so ill at the thought that Rand made her lie down and had Sulin bring damp cloths to lay on her forehead. This time he was the one to sit on the mattress and hold her hand. She held on very tight.
She did not give up her teasing, though. The two times he could be absolutely sure she would be there were when he practiced the sword, dancing the forms with four or five of the best he could find among the Tairen and Cairhienin soldiers, and when he and Rhuarc or Gaul were tossing each other about and trying to kick each other in the head. Inevitably Min ran a finger across his bare chest and made some joke about sheepfarmers not sweating because they were used to having wool as thick as their sheep or the like. Sometimes she touched the half-healed, never-healing scar on his side, that circle of pale pink flesh, but differently, softly; she never made any jokes about that. She pinched his bottom — startling to say the least when other people were about; Maidens and Wise Ones nearly fell over laughing every single time he jumped; Sulin looked as if she might burst from not laughing — snuggled in his lap and kissed him at every opportunity, she even threatened to come scrub his back in his bath one of these nights. When he pretended to weep and stammer, she laughed and said it was not good enough.
Min did quit quickly enough if a Maiden stuck her head in to announce someone, especially Loial, who never stayed long and talked of the Royal Library the whole time, or Perrin, who stayed even more briefly and for some reason looked increasingly tired. Most especially Min leaped up if Faile happened to be with either one. The two times that happened, Min hastily found a book among those Rand had in the bedchamber and sat pretending to read,
opening it somewhere in the middle as if she had been at it for some time. Rand did not understand the cool looks the two women exchanged. It was not precisely animosity, or even unfriendliness exactly, but Rand suspected that if either made a list of those she would just as soon not spend time with, the other’s name would be prominent.
The amusing thing of it was, the second time, the book turned out to be the leather-bound first volume of Daria Gahand’s Essays on Reason, which he had found heavy going and intended to send back to the Library the next time Loial stopped in. Min actually went on reading for a time after Faile left, and for all her frowning and muttering, that night Min took it back to her own rooms in the guest apartments.
If cool disinterest reigned between Min and Faile, between Min and Berelain animosity was not in it. When Somara announced Berelain on the second afternoon, Rand put on his coat, strode into the anteroom and took the tall gilded chair on the dais before telling Somara to admit her. Min was slow in reaching the sitting room, though. Berelain swept in, as beautiful as ever, in a soft blue dress cut as deeply as ever — and her eyes fell on Min, in her pale rose coat and breeches. For several long moments Rand might as well not have existed. Berelain openly eyed Min up and down. Min forgot about the sitting room; she put her hands on her hips and stood there with one knee bent, studying Berelain just as openly. They smiled at each other; Rand thought the hair on his head would stand up when they did that. He was minded of nothing so much as two strange cats who had just discovered they were shut up in the same small room. Apparently deciding there was no point hiding now, Min walked — undulated would have been a better word; she managed to make Berelain’s way of walking look like a boy’s! — and sat with one knee over the other, still smiling. Light, how those women did smile.
Lord of Chaos twot-6 Page 102