Nynaeve stood in front of the fireplace with Egwene's pouch in one hand, tugging her braid. Elayne sat by the table, making nervous conversation.
"Green Ajah," the golden-haired woman said for what Egwene thought must be the twentieth time since midday. "I might choose Green Ajah myself, Egwene. Then I can have three or four Warders, perhaps marry one of them. Who better for Prince Consort of Andor than a Warder? Unless it is…" She trailed off, blushing.
Egwene felt a pang of jealousy she thought she had put down long ago, and sympathy mixed with it. Light, how can I be jealous when I cannot look at Galad without shivering and feeling as if I am melting, both at the same time? Rand was mine, but no more. I wish I could give him to you, Elayne, but he is not for either of us, I think. It may be all well and good for the Daughter-Heir to marry a commoner, as long as he's an Andorman, but not to marry the Dragon Reborn. She let the stockings fall on the floor, telling herself there were more important things to worry about tonight than neatness. "I am ready, Nynaeve."
Nynaeve handed her the pouch, and a long, thin strip of leather. "Perhaps it will work for more than one at once. I could… go with you, perhaps."
Emptying the stone ring onto her palm, Egwene threaded the leather strip through it, then tied it around her neck. The stripes and flecks of blue and brown and red seemed more vivid against the white of her shift. "And leave Elayne to watch over the both of us alone? When the Black Ajah may know us?"
"I can do it," Elayne said stoutly. "Or let me go with you, and Nynaeve can keep guard. She is the strongest of us, when she's angry, and if there is need for a guard, you can be sure she will be."
Egwene shook her head. "What if it won't work for two? What if two of us trying makes it not work at all? We would not even know till we woke up, and then we've wasted the night. We cannot waste even one if we are to catch up. We're too far behind them already." They were valid reasons, and she believed them, but there was another, closer to her heart. "Besides, I'll feel better knowing both of you are watching over me, in case…"
She did not want to say it. In case someone came while she was asleep. The Gray Men. The Black Ajah. Any one of the things that had turned the White Tower from a place of safety to a dark woods full of pits and snares. Something coming in while she lay there helpless. Their faces showed they understood.
As she stretched herself out on the bed and plumped a feather pillow behind her head, Elayne moved the chairs, one to either side of the bed. Nynaeve snuffed the candles one by one, then, in the dark, sat in one of the chairs. Elayne took the other.
Egwene closed her eyes and tried to think sleepy thoughts, but she was too conscious of the thing lying between her breasts. Far more conscious than of any soreness remaining from her visit to Sheriam's study. The ring seemed to weigh as much as a brick, now, and thoughts of home and quiet pools of water all slid apart with remembrance of it. Of Tel'aran'rhiod. The Unseen World. The World of Dreams. Waiting just the other side of sleep.
Nynaeve began to hum softly. Egwene recognized a nameless, wordless tune her mother used to hum to her when she was little. When she was lying in bed, in her own room, with a fluffy pillow, and warm blankets, and the mingled smells of rose oil and baking from her mother, and… Rand, are you all right? Perrin? Who was she? Sleep came.
She stood among rolling hills quilted with wildflowers and dotted with small thickets of leafy trees in the hollows and on the crests. Butterflies floated above the blossoms, wings flashing yellow and blue and green, and two larks sang to each other nearby. Just enough fluffy white clouds drifted in a soft blue sky, and the breeze held that delicate balance between cool and warm that came only a few special days in spring. It was a day too perfect to be anything but a dream.
She looked at her dress, and laughed delightedly. Exactly her favorite shade of sky-blue silk, slashed with white in the skirt — that changed to green as she frowned momentarily — sewn with rows of tiny pearls down the sleeves and across the bosom. She stuck out a foot just to peek at the toe of a velvet slipper. The only jarring note was the twisted ring of multicolored stone hanging around her neck on a leather cord.
She took the ring in her hand and gasped. It felt as light as a feather. If she tossed it up, she was sure it would drift away like thistle down. Somehow, she did not feel afraid of it any longer. She tucked it inside the neck of her dress to get it out of the way.
"So this is Verin's Tel'aran'rhiod," she said. "Corianin Nedeal's World of Dreams. It does not look dangerous to me." But Verin had said it was. Black Ajah or not, Egwene did not see how any Aes Sedai could tell a lie right out. She could be mistaken. But she did not believe Verin was.
Just to see if she could, she opened herself to the One Power. Saidar filled her. Even here, it was present. She channeled the flow lightly, delicately, directed it into the breeze, swirling butterflies into fluttering spirals of color, into circles linked with circles.
Abruptly she let it go. The butterflies settled back, unconcerned by their brief adventure. Myrddraal and some other Shadowspawn could sense someone channeling. Looking around, she could not imagine such things in that place, but just because she could not imagine them did not mean they were not there. And the Black Ajah had all those ter'angreal studied by Corianin Nedeal. It was a sickening reminder of why she was there.
"At least I know I can channel," she muttered. "I'm not learning anything standing here. Perhaps if I look around…" She took a step…
… and was standing in the dank, dark hallway of an inn. She was an innkeeper's daughter; she was sure it was an inn. There was not a sound, and all the doors along the hall were shut tight. Just as she wondered who was behind the plain wooden door in front of her, it swung silently open.
The room within was bare, and cold wind moaned through open windows, stirring old ash on the hearth. A big dog lay curled up on the floor, shaggy tail across its nose, between the door and a thick pillar of rough-cut, black stone that stood in the middle of the floor. A large, shaggy-haired young man sat leaning back against the pillar in only his smallclothes, head lolling as if asleep. A massive black chain ran around the pillar and across his chest, the ends gripped in his clenched hands. Asleep or not, his heavy muscles strained to hold that chain tight, to prison himself against the pillar.
"Perrin?" she said wonderingly. She stepped into the room. "Perrin, what's the matter with you? Perrin!" The dog uncurled itself and stood.
It was not a dog, but a wolf, all black and gray, lips curling back from glistening white teeth, yellow eyes regarding her as they might have a mouse. A mouse it meant to eat.
Egwene stepped back hastily into the hall in spite of herself. "Perrin! Wake up! There's a wolf!" Verin had said what happened here was real, and showed the scar to prove it. The wolf's teeth looked as big as knives. "Perrin, wake up! Tell it I'm a friend!" She embraced saidar. The wolf stalked nearer.
Perrin's head came up; his eyes opened drowsily. Two sets of yellow eyes regarded her. The wolf gathered himself. "Hopper," Perrin shouted, "no! Egwene!"
The door swung shut before her face, and total darkness enveloped her.
She could not see, but she felt sweat beading on her forehead. Not from heat. Light, where am I? I don't like this place. I want to wake up!
A whirring sound, and she jumped before she recognized a cricket. A frog gave a bass croak in the darkness, and a chorus answered it. As her eyes adapted, she dimly made out trees all around her. Clouds blanketed the stars, and the moon was a thin sliver.
Off to her right through the woods was another glow, flickering. A campfire.
She considered a moment before moving. Wanting to wake up had not been enough to take her way from Tel'aran'rhiod, and she still had not found out anything useful. And she had not been hurt in any way. So far, she thought, shivering. But she had no idea who — or what — was at that campfire. It could be Myrddraal. Besides, I'm not dressed for running around in the forest. It was the last thought that decided her; she prided herself
on knowing when she was being foolish.
Taking a deep breath, she gathered up her silken skirts and crept closer. She might not have Nynaeve's skill at woodcraft, but she knew enough to avoid stepping on dead twigs. At last she peered carefully around the trunk of an old oak at the campfire.
The only one there was a tall young man, sitting and staring into the flames. Rand. Those flames did not burn wood. They did not burn anything that she could see. The fire danced above a bare patch of ground. She did not think they even scorched the soil.
Before she could move, Rand raised his head. She was surprised to see he was smoking a pipe, a thin ribbon of tabac smoke lifting from the bowl. He looked tired, so very tired.
"Who's out there?" he demanded loudly. "You've rustled enough leaves to wake the dead, so you might as well show yourself."
Egwene's lips compressed, but she stepped out. I did not! "It's me, Rand. Do not be afraid. It is a dream. I must be in your dreams."
He was on his feet so suddenly that she stopped dead. He seemed in some way larger than she remembered. And a touch dangerous. Perhaps more than a touch. His blue-gray eyes seemed to burn like frozen fire.
"Do you think I don't know it is a dream?" he sneered. "I know that makes it no less real." He stared angrily out into the darkness as if looking for someone. "How long will you try?" he shouted at the night. "How many faces will you send? My mother, my father, now her! Pretty girls won't tempt me with a kiss, not even one I know! I deny you, Father of Lies! I deny you!"
"Rand," she said uncertainly. "It's Egwene. I am Egwene."
There was a sword in his hands, suddenly, out of nowhere. Its blade was worked out of a single flame, slightly curved and graven with a heron. "My mother gave me honeycake," he said in a tight voice, "with the smell of poison rank on it. My father had a knife for my ribs. She — she offered kisses, and more." Sweat slicked his face; his stare seemed enough to set her afire. "What do you bring?"
"You are going to listen to me, Rand al'Thor, if I have to sit on you." She gathered saidar, channeled the flows to make the air hold him in a net.
The sword spun in his hands, roaring like an open furnace.
She grunted and staggered; it felt as if a rope stretched too tight had broken and snapped back into her.
Rand laughed. "I learn, you see. When it works…" He grimaced and started toward her. "I could stand any face but that one. Not her face, burn you!" The sword flashed out.
Egwene fled.
She was not sure what it was she did, or how, but she found herself back among the rolling hills under a sunny sky, with larks singing and butterflies playing. She drew a deep, shuddering breath.
I've learned… What? That the Dark One is still after Rand? I knew that already. That maybe the Dark One wants to kill him? That's different. Unless maybe he's gone mad already, and does not know what he is saying. Light, why couldn't I help him? Oh, Light, Rand!
She took another long breath to calm herself. "The only way to help him is to gentle him," she muttered. "As well go ahead and kill him." Her stomach twisted and knotted. "I'll never do that. Never!"
A redbird had perched on a cloudberry bush nearby, crest lifting as it tilted its head to watch her cautiously. She addressed the bird. "Well, I am not helping anything standing here talking to myself, am I? Or talking to you, either."
The redbird took wing as she stepped toward the bush. It was still a flash of crimson as she took the next step, vanished into a thicket she took a third.
She stopped and fished the stone ring on its cord out of the front of her dress. Why was it not changing? Everything had changed so fast up till now that she could hardly catch her breath. Why not now? Unless there was some answer right here? She looked around uncertainly. The wildflowers taunted her, and the larksong mocked her. This place seemed too much of her own making.
Determined, she tightened her hand around the ter'angreal. "Take me where I need to be." She shut her eyes and concentrated on the ring. It was stone, after all; Earth should give her some feeling for it. "Do it. Take me where I need to be." Once again she embraced saidar, fed a trickle of the One Power into the ring. She knew it did not need any flow of Power directed at it to work, and she did not try to do anything to it. Only to give it more of the Power to use. "Take me to where I can find an answer. I need to know what the Black Ajah wants. Take me to the answer."
"Well, you've found your way at last, child. All sorts of answers here."
Egwene's eyes snapped open. She stood in a great hall, its vast domed ceiling supported by a forest of massive redstone columns. And hanging in midair was a sword of crystal, gleaming and sparkling as it slowly revolved. She was not certain, but she thought it might be the sword Rand had been reaching for in that dream. That other dream. This all felt so real, she had to keep reminding herself it was a dream, too.
An old woman stepped out of the shadows of the column, bent and hobbling with a stick. Ugly did not begin to describe her. She had a bony, pointed chin, an even bonier, sharper nose, and it seemed there were more warts growing hairs on her face than there was face.
"Who are you?" Egwene said. The only people she had seen so far in Tel'aran'rhiod were those she already knew, but she did not think she could have forgotten this poor old woman.
"Just poor old Silvie, my Lady," the old woman cackled. At the same time she managed a stoop that might have been meant for a curtsy, or possibly a cringe. "You know poor old Silvie, my Lady. Served your family faithfully all these years. Does this old face still frighten you? Don't let it, my Lady. It serves me, when I need it, as good as a prettier."
"Of course, it does," Egwene said. "It's a strong face. A good face." She hoped the woman believed it. Whoever this Silvie was, she seemed to think she knew Egwene. Perhaps she knew answers, too. "Silvie, you said something about finding answers here."
"Oh, you've come to the right place for answers, my Lady. The Heart of the Stone is full of answers. And secrets. The High Lords would not be pleased to see us here, my Lady. Oh, no. None but the High Lords enter here. And servants, of course." She gave a sly, screeching laugh. "The High Lords don't sweep and mop. But who sees a servant?"
"What kind of secrets?"
But Silvie was hobbling toward the crystal sword. "Plots," she said as if to herself. "All of them pretending to serve the Great Lord, and all the while plotting and planning to regain what they lost. Each one thinking he or she is the only one plotting. Ishamael is a fool!"
"What?" Egwene said sharply. "What did you say about Ishamael?"
The old woman turned to present a crooked, ingratiating smile. "Just a thing poor folks say, my Lady. It turns the Forsaken's power, calling them fools. Makes you feel good, and safe. Even the Shadow can't take being called a fool. Try it, my Lady. Say, Ba'alzamon is a fool!"
Egwene's lips twitched on the edge of a smile. "Ba'alzamon is a fool! You are right, Silvie." It actually did feel good, laughing at the Dark One. The old woman chuckled. The sword revolved just beyond her shoulder. "Silvie, what is that?"
"Callandor, my Lady. You know that, don't you? The Sword That Cannot Be Touched." Abruptly she swung her stick behind her; a foot from the sword, the stick stopped with a dull thwack and bounded back. Silvie grinned wider. "The Sword That Is Not a Sword, though there's precious few knows what it is. But none can touch it save one. They saw to that, who put it here. The Dragon Reborn will hold Callandor one day, and prove to the world he's the Dragon by doing it. The first proof, anyway. Lews Therin come back for all the world to see, and grovel before. Ah, the High Lords don't like having it here. They like nothing to do with the Power. They'd rid themselves of it, if they could. If they could. I suppose there's others would take it, if they could. What wouldn't one of the Forsaken give, to hold Callandor?"
Egwene stared at the sparkling sword. If the Prophecies of the Dragon were true, if Rand was the Dragon as Moiraine claimed, he would wield it one day, though from the rest of what she knew of the Prophecies concerning Calla
ndor, she could not see how it could ever come to be. But if there's a way to take it, maybe the Black Ajah knows how. If they know it, I can figure it out.
Cautiously, she reached out with the Power, probing at whatever held and shielded the sword. Her probe touched — something — and stopped. She could sense which of the Five Powers had been used here. Air, and Fire, and Spirit. She could trace the intricate weave made by saidar, set with a strength that amazed her. There were gaps in that weave, spaces where her probe should slide through. When she tried, it was like fighting the strongest part of the weave head on. It hit her then, what she was trying to force a way through, and she let her probe vanish. Half that wall had been woven using saidar; the other half, the part she could not sense or touch, had been made with saidin. That was not it, exactly — the wall was all of one piece — but it was close enough. A stone wall stops a blind woman as surely as one who can see it.
Footsteps echoed in the distance. Boots.
Egwene could not tell how many there were, or from which direction they were coming, but Silvie gave a start and immediately stared off among the columns. "He's coming to stare at it again," she muttered. "Awake or asleep, he wants…" She seemed to remember Egwene, and put on a worried smile. "You must leave, now, my Lady. He mustn't find you here, or even know you've been."
Egwene was already backing in among the columns, and Silvie followed, flapping her hands and waving her stick. "I am going, Silvie. I just have to remember the way." She fingered the stone ring. "Take me back to the hills." Nothing happened: She channeled a hairlike flow to the ring. "Take me back to the hills." The redstone columns still surrounded her. The boots were closer, close enough not to be swallowed in their own echoes anymore.
"You don't know the way out," Sylvie said flatly, then went on in a near whisper, ingratiating and mocking at once, an old retainer who felt she could take liberties. "Oh, my Lady, this is a dangerous place to come into, if you don't know the way out. Come, let poor old Silvie take you out. Poor old Silvie will tuck you safe in your bed, my Lady." She wrapped both arms around Egwene, urging her further from the sword. Not that Egwene needed much urging. The boots had stopped; he — whoever he was — was probably gazing at Callandor.
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