"The world rides on my shoulders," he murmured. Suddenly he yelped and clapped a hand to his left buttock. It felt as though a needle had stabbed him, but he did not need the goose bumps fading on his arms to tell him what had happened. "What was that for?" he growled at Aviendha.
"Just to see whether the Lord Dragon was still made of flesh like the rest of us mortals."
"I am," he said flatly, and seized saidin— all the sweetness; all the filth — just, long enough to channel briefly.
Her eyes widened, but she did not flinch, only looked at him as if nothing had occurred at all. Still, as they crossed the anteroom, she rubbed furtively at her bottom when she thought he was looking the other way. It seemed she was ordinary flesh, too. Burn me. I thought I'd taught her a few manners.
Pulling open the door, he stepped out and stood staring. Mat was leaning on his odd spear with that broad-brimmed hat pulled low, a little apart from Asmodean, but that was not took him aback. There were no Maidens. He should have known something was wrong when Asmodean came in unannounced. Aviendha was looking around in amazement, as if she expected to find them behind one of the tapestries.
"Melindhra tried to kill me last night," Mat said, and Rand stopped thinking about Maidens. "One minute we were talking, the next she was trying to kick my head off."
Mat told the story in short sentences. The dagger with the golden bees. His conclusions. He closed his eyes when he told how he had ended it — a simple, stark, "I killed her" — and opened them again quickly as if he saw something behind his eyelids he did not care to see.
"I'm sorry you had to do that," Rand said quietly, and Mat gave a bleak shrug.
"Better her than me. I suppose. She was a Darkfriend." He did not sound as if it made much difference.
"I will settle Sammael. Just as soon as I'm ready."
"And how many will that leave?"
"The Forsaken are not here," Aviendha snapped. "And neither are the Maidens of the Spear. Where are they? What have you done, Rand al'Thor?"
"Me? There were twenty right here when I came to bed last night, and I haven't seen one since."
"Perhaps it is because Mat…" Asmodean began, and stopped when Mat looked at him, a tight-mouthed blend of pain and readiness to hit something.
"Do not be fools," Aviendha said in a firm voice. "Far Dareis Mai would not claim toh against Mat Cauthon for this. She tried to kill him, and he killed her. Even her near-sisters would not, if she had had any. And no one would claim toh against Rand al'Thor for what another did, unless he ordered it done. You have done something, Rand al'Thor, something great and dark, or they would be here."
"I've done nothing," he told her sharply. "And I don't intend to stand here discussing it. Are you dressed for the ride south, Mat?"
Mat shoved a hand into his coat pocket, fingering something. He usually kept his dice and dice-cup in there. "Caemlyn. I'm tired of them sneaking up on me. I want to sneak up on one of them for a change. I just hope I get the bloody pat on the head instead of the bloody flower," he added with a grimace.
Rand did not ask him what he meant. Another ta'veren. Two together to twist chance perhaps. No way to tell how, or even if, but…"It seems like we'll be together a little longer." Mat looked more resigned than anything else.
Before they had gone far down the tapestry-lined corridor, Moiraine and Egwene met them, gliding along together as if the day held no more ahead than a walk in one of the gardens. Egwene, cool-eyed and calm, golden Great Serpent on her finger, really could have been Aes Sedai despite her Aiel clothes and shawl and the folded scarf around her temples, while Moiraine… Gold threads caught the light, faintly streaking Moiraine's gown of shimmering blue silk. The small blue stone on her forehead, hanging from its gold chain fastened in her waves of dark hair, shone as brightly as the large gold-set sapphires around her neck. Hardly suitable garb for what they intended, yet in his red coat, Rand could not comment.
Perhaps it was being here, where House Damodred had once held the Sun Throne, but Moiraine's graceful carriage was more regal than he remembered ever seeing it. Not even the presence of "Jasin Natael" could spoil that queenly serenity with surprise, but amazingly, she gave Mat a warm smile. "So you are going too, Mat. Learn to trust the Pattern. Do not waste your life attempting to change what cannot be changed." From Mat's face, he might have been considering changing his mind about being there at all, but the Aes Sedai turned from him without a trace of worry. "These are for you, Rand."
"More letters?" he said. One bore his name in an elegant hand that he recognized immediately. "From you, Moiraine?" The other carried Thom Merrilin's name. Both had been sealed with blue wax, apparently with her Great Serpent ring, impressed with the image of the snake biting its own tail. "Why write me a letter? And sealed. You've never been afraid to say whatever you wanted to say to my face. If I ever forgot it, Aviendha has been reminding me that I'm only flesh and blood."
"You have changed from the boy I first saw outside the Winespring Inn." Her voice was a soft silver chiming. "You are hardly the same at all. I pray you have changed enough."
Egwene murmured something low. Rand thought it was "I pray you have not changed too much." She was frowning at the letters as if she too wondered what was in them. So was Aviendha.
Moiraine went on more brightly, even briskly. "Seals ensure privacy. That contains things I wish you to think on; not now; when you have time for thinking. As for Thom's letter, I know no safer hands than yours in which to place it. Give it to him when you see him again. Now, there is something you must see at the docks."
"The docks?" Rand said. "Moiraine, this morning of all mornings, I've no time for —"
But she was already moving down the corridor as if sure he would follow. "I have had horses readied. Even one for you, Mat, just in case." Egwene hesitated only a moment, then followed.
Rand opened his mouth to call Moiraine back. She had sworn to obey. Whatever she had to show him, he could see it another day.
"What could an hour hurt?" Mat muttered. Perhaps he was reconsidering.
"It would not be amiss for you to be seen this morning," Asmodean said. "Rahvin might just know of it as soon as it happens. If he has any suspicions — if he has any spies who may have listened at keyholes — it might allay them for today."
Rand looked at Aviendha. "Do you also counsel delay?"
"I counsel that you listen to Moiraine Sedai. Only fools ignore Aes Sedai."
"What could be at the docks more important than Rahvin?" he growled, then shook his head. There was a saying in the Two Rivers, not that anybody said it where women could hear. "The Creator made women to please the eye and trouble the mind." Aes Sedai were certainly no different in one respect. "One hour."
The sun was not yet high enough to lift the city wall's long shadow from the stone quay where Kadere's wagons were lined up, but he still mopped his face with a large handkerchief. It was only partly the heat that made him sweat. Great gray curtain walls stretching into the river at either end of the row of docks made the quay seem a dim box, with him caught in it. There were nothing but broad, round-bowed grain barges docked here, and the same anchored in the river waiting their turn to unload. He had considered slipping onto one when it cast off, but it meant abandoning most of what he still possessed. Yet had he thought the slow passage downriver would take him anywhere except to his death, he would have. Lanfear had not returned to his dreams, but he had the burns on his chest to remind him of her commands. Just the thought of disobeying one of the Chosen made him shiver, even with sweat rolling down his face.
If only he knew who to trust; to the extent it was possible to trust any of his fellow Darkfriends. The last of his drivers who had sworn the oaths had vanished two days ago, very likely on one of the grain barges. He still did not know which Aiel woman had slipped that note under his wagon door —"You are not alone among strangers. A way has been chosen" — though he had several possibilities in mind. The docks held almost as many Aiel as the
y did workmen, come to stare at the river; he had seen a few of those faces more often than seemed reasonable, and some had looked at him consideringly. A few Cairhienin had as well, and a Tairen lord. That meant nothing by itself, of course, but if he could find a few men to work with…
A mounted party appeared in one of the gateways, Moiraine and Rand al'Thor leading the way with the Aes Sedai's Warder as they threaded though the carts hauling grain-sacks away. A wave of cheers rode with them.
"All glory to the Lord Dragon!" and "Hail the Lord Dragon!" and now and again "Glory to Lord Matrim! Glory to the Red Hand!"
For once the Aes Sedai turned down toward the tail end of the line of wagons without so much as a glance at Kadere. He was just as glad. Even if she had not been Aes Sedai, even if she had not looked at him as if she knew every black corner of his mind, he would as soon not have looked too closely at some of the things she had filled his wagons with. Yesterday evening she had made him strip the canvas off that oddly twisted redstone doorframe in the wagon just behind his. She seemed to take a perverse delight in making him help her himself with whatever she wanted to study. He would have covered the thing up again if he could bear to go near it, or could make any of his drivers do so. None with him now had seen Herid fall half through it in Rhuidean and half disappear — Herid had been the first to run away once they cleared the Jangai; the man had not been entirely right in the head after the Warder hauled him back — but they could look at it, see the way the corners did not meet properly, how you could not follow it around with your eyes without blinking and growing dizzy.
Kadere ignored the first three riders as much as the Aes Sedai had ignored him, and Mat Cauthon almost as much. The man was wearing his hat; he had never been able to find a replacement. The Aiel wench, Aviendha, rode up behind the young Aes Sedai's saddle, both with their skirts pushed up to show their legs. If he needed any confirmation that the Aiel woman was bedding al'Thor, he only had to see the way she looked at him; a woman who had taken a man to her bed always looked at him with that light of ownership in her eyes after. More importantly, Natael was with them. This was the first time Kadere had been this close to him since crossing the Spine of the World. Natael, who stood high in the Darkfriends. If he could get past the Maidens to reach Natael…
Suddenly Kadere blinked. Where were the Maidens? Al'Thor always had an escort of spear-wielding women. Frowning, he realized he could not see a single Maiden among the Aiel on the quay or the docks.
"Aren't you going to look at an old friend, Hadnan?"
That melodious voice jerked Kadere around, gaping at a hatchet-nosed face, dark eyes almost hidden by rolls of fat. "Keille?" It was impossible. No one survived alone in the Waste except Aiel. She had to be dead. But there she stood, white silk straining over her bulk, ivory combs standing tall in her dark curls.
A faint smile on her lips, she turned with a grace that still surprised him in a woman so large and lightly, climbed the steps into his wagon.
For a moment he hesitated, then hurried after her. He would as soon Keille Shaogi really had died in the Waste — the woman was bossy and obnoxious; she need not think she was getting a penny of the little he had managed to salvage — but she stood as high as Jasin Natael. Perhaps she would answer a few questions. At the least, he would have someone to work with. At the worst, someone to put blame on. Power went with standing high, but so did blame for the failures of those beneath you. More than once he had fed his superiors to those still higher up in order to cover himself.
Carefully closing the door, he turned — and would have screamed if his throat had not clenched too tight for sound.
The woman who stood there wore white silk, but she was not fat. She was the most beautiful woman he had ever seen, eyes like dark, bottomless mountain pools, woven silver belting her narrow waist, silver crescents in her shimmering black hair. Kadere knew that face from his dreams.
His knees thudding to the floor shook breath loose. "Great Mistress," he said hoarsely, "how may I serve?"
Lanfear might have been looking at an insect, one she might crush beneath her slipper or might not. "By showing your obedience to my commands. I have been too busy to watch Rand al'Thor myself. Tell me what he has done, aside from conquering Cairhien, what he plans to do."
"It is difficult, Great Mistress. One such as myself cannot come close to such as he." An insect, those cool eyes said, allowed to live so long as it was useful. Kadere racked his brain for everything he had seen or heard or imagined. "He is sending Aiel south in huge numbers, Great Mistress, though I do not know why. The Tairens and Cairhienin do not seem to notice, but I don't think they can tell one Aiel from another." Neither could he. He would not dare lie to her, but if she thought he had more use than he did… He has founded a school of some sort, in a city palace that belonged to a House with no survivors…" At first there was no way to tell whether she liked what she was hearing, but as he went on, her face began to darken.
"What is it you want me to see, Moiraine?" Rand said impatiently, tying Jeade'en's reins to one wheel of the last wagon in line.
She was standing on tiptoe to peer over the side of the wagonbed at a pair of casks that seemed familiar. Unless he was mistaken, they held the two cuendillar seals, packed in wool for protection now that they were no longer unbreakable. He felt the Dark One's taint strongly here; it almost seemed to come from the casks, a faint miasma as from something rotting in a hidden place.
"It will be safe here," Moiraine murmured. Lifting her skirts gracefully, she started up the line of wagons. Lan heeled her, a half-tame wolf, the cloak hanging down his back all disturbing ripples of color and nothingness.
Rand glared. "Did she tell you what it was, Egwene?"
"Just that you had to see something. That you had to come here, anyway."
"You must trust Aes Sedai," Aviendha said, almost as levelly, but with a hint of doubt. Mat snorted.
"Well, I mean to find out now. Natael, go tell Bael I'll be with him in —"
At the other end of the line, the side of Kadere's wagon exploded, splinters scything down Aiel and townsfolk. Rand knew; he did not need goose bumps prickling his skin to know. He raced, toward the wagon, after Moiraine and Lan. Time seemed to slow, everything happening at once, as if the air were jelly clinging to each moment.
Lanfear stepped out into stunned silence except for the moans and screams of the injured, something limp and pale and red-streaked hanging from her hand, dragging behind her as she walked down invisible steps. Her face was a mask carved of ice. "He told me, Lews Therin," she almost screamed, flinging the pale thing into the air. Something caught it, inflated it for a moment into a bloody, transparent, statue of Hadnan Kadere; his skin, removed whole. The figure collapsed and fell as Lanfear's voice rose to a screech. "You let another woman touch you! Again!"
Moments clinging, all happening at once.
Before Lanfear reached the stones of the quay, Moiraine lifted her skirts higher and began running straight toward her. Quick as she was, Lan was quicker, ignoring her shout of, "No, Lan!" Sword coming out, long legs carried him ahead of her, color-shifting cloak waving behind as he charged. Suddenly he seemed to run into an invisible stone wall, bounce back, try to stagger forward again. One step, and as if a giant hand had smashed him aside, he flew ten paces through the air, crashing to the stones.
While he was in midair, Moiraine jerked forward, feet skidding along the pavement, until she was face to face with Lanfear. It was only for a moment. The Forsaken looked at her as though wondering what could have gotten in her way, then Moiraine was flung to one side so hard she rolled over and over until she disappeared beneath one of the wagons.
The quayside was in turmoil. Just moments since Kadere's wagon erupted, yet only the blind could not know the One Power was being wielded by the woman in white. Along the docks axes flashed, cutting ropes, freeing barges as their crews desperately fended the craft toward open water and flight. Bare-chested dockmen and dark-clothed townsfo
lk struggled to jump aboard. In the other direction men and women milled and screamed as they fought to pass through the gates into the city. And among them, cadin'sor—clad figures veiled themselves and rushed at Lanfear with spears or knives or bare hands. There could be no doubt she was the source of the attack, no doubt she fought with the Power. They ran to dance the spears regardless.
Fire rolled over them in waves. Arrows of it pierced those who came on with their clothes in flames. It was not as if Lanfear battled them, or even paid them any real mind. She might have been brushing aside gnats or bitemes. Those who fled burned as well as those who tried to fight. She moved toward Rand as if nothing else existed.
Heartbeats only.
Three steps she had taken when Rand seized the male half of the True Source, molten steel and steel-shattering ice, sweet honey and midden heap. Deep in the Void, the fight for survival was distant, the battle before him scarcely less. As Moiraine vanished beneath the wagon, he channeled, pulling the heat from Lanfear's fires, sinking it into the river. Flames that a moment before engulfed human forms, vanished. In the same instant he wove the flows again, and a misty gray dome came into being, a long oval enclosing him and Lanfear and most of the wagons, an almost transparent wall that shut out all not already within. Even as he tied the weave, he was not sure what it was or where it had come from — some memory of Lews Therin's perhaps — but Lanfear's fires struck it and stopped. He could see people outside dimly, too many thrashing and flailing — he had taken the flames, not the searing of flesh; that stench still hung in the air — but none would burn now that had not already. Bodies lay inside, too, mounds of charred cloth, some stirring feebly, moaning. She did not care; her channeled flames winked out; the gnats were dispelled; she never glanced aside.
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