Crossroads of Twilight

by Jordan, Robert

  Egwene’s head came up as she read to the bottom of the page, and she hurriedly set that page down and picked up the next. The Grays had had some hopes. Apparently, a Gray sister had been recognized coming out of the Stone, and followed to a meeting with High Lord Tedosian and High Lady Estanda, two of the most prominent among the besiegers. “Merana,” she breathed. “They say it was Merana Ambrey, Siuan.” Unconsciously, she massaged her temple. The pain behind her eyes had ratcheted a little higher.

  “She may do some good.” Rising, Siuan crossed the carpets to a small table against the tent wall, where several mismatched cups and two pitchers sat on a tray. The silver pitcher held spiced wine, the blue-glazed pottery tea, both set there at first light against the Amyrlin’s arrival and both long since gone cold. No one had expected Egwene to go riding off to the river. “As long as Tedosian and the others don’t realize who she’s really working for.” Siuan’s shawl slipped off one shoulder as she felt the side of the pottery pitcher, and the light of saidar surrounded her briefly as she channeled Fire, warming the contents. “They won’t trust her to negotiate in good faith if they find out she’s the Dragon Reborn’s creature.” Filling a polished pewter cup with tea, she added generous dollops from the honey jar, stirring it in well, and brought the cup back to Egwene. “This might help your head. It’s some sort of herb concoction Chesa found, but honey cuts the taste.”

  Egwene took a cautious sip, and set the cup down with a shudder. If it tasted that sharp with honey, she did not want to imagine it without. The headache might be better. “How can you take this so calmly, Siuan? Merana turning up in Tear is the first real proof we’ve had. I’ll take your Sitters as coincidence before that.”

  In the beginning, there had only been whispers, from the Ajahs or from Siuan’s eyes-and-ears. There were Aes Sedai in Cairhien, and they seemed to move freely in and out of the Sun Palace while the Dragon Reborn was there. Then the whispers grew hoarse and uneasy, hesitant. The eyes-and-ears in Cairhien did not want to say it. No one wanted to repeat what their agents said. There were Aes Sedai in Cairhien, and they seemed to be following the orders of the Dragon Reborn. Worse were the names that trickled out. Some were women who had been in Salidar, among the first to resist Elaida, while others were women known to be loyal to Elaida. No one had mentioned Compulsion aloud that Egwene knew of, but they had to be thinking it.

  “No use pulling your hair when the wind isn’t blowing the way you want,” Siuan replied, taking her stool again. She started to cross her knees, but hastily put both feet back on the carpet when her stool tilted. Muttering under her breath, she adjusted her shawl with a twitch of her shoulders. And was forced to balance against another lurch. “You have to trim your sails to take advantage of how the wind is blowing. Think coolly, and you make it back to shore. Get your neck hot, and you’ll drown.” Sometimes, Siuan could sound as if she still worked a fishing boat. “I believe you need more than one sip for that to do any good, Mother.”

  With a grimace, Egwene pushed the cup a little farther from her. The taste clinging to her tongue was at least as bad as her headache. “Siuan, if you see a way to make use of this, I wish you’d tell me. I don’t even want to think about using the fact that Rand may have Compelled sisters. I don’t want to think about the possibility that he could have.” Neither about the possibility that he knew such a repulsive weave, or that he could lay that weave on anyone. She knew it—another little gift from Moghedien—and she very much wished she could forget how to make it.

  “In this case, it isn’t so much a matter of using as figuring out the effects. He’ll have to be dealt with eventually, and maybe taught a lesson, but you don’t want sisters flying off after him now, and these tales out of Cairhien make everyone cautious.” Siuan’s voice was calm enough, but she fidgeted, clearly agitated inwardly. It was nothing any Aes Sedai could speak of too calmly. “At the same time, once everyone thinks it through, they’ll realize this makes nonsense out of those stories about him submitting to Elaida. She might have sent sisters to watch over him, but they wouldn’t accept sisters who want to pull Elaida down. Realizing that will put a little backbone in those who’ve started thinking maybe Elaida has him on a lead. That’s one less reason for anyone to consider yielding to her.”

  “What about Cadsuane?” Egwene said. Of all the names coming out of Cairhien, that one had sent the most shock through the sisters. Cadsuane Melaidhrin was a legend, and there were as many disapproving versions of the legend as approving. Some sisters had been sure it must be a mistake; Cadsuane must be dead by now. Others just appeared to wish she were dead. “Are you certain she remained in Cairhien after Rand disappeared?”

  “I made sure my people kept an eye on her as soon as I heard her name,” Siuan said, no longer sounding at all calm. “I don’t know she’s a Darkfriend, I just suspect, but I can guarantee that she was in the Sun Palace a week after he vanished.”

  Squeezing her eyes shut, Egwene pressed the heels of her palms against her lids. That hardly seemed to affect the pulsing needle in her head. Maybe Rand was in company with a Black sister, or had been. Maybe he had used Compulsion on Aes Sedai. Bad enough on anyone, but somehow worse used on Aes Sedai, more ominous. What was dared against Aes Sedai was ten times, a hundred times, as likely to be used against those who could not defend themselves. Eventually they would have to deal with him, somehow. She had grown up with Rand, yet she could not allow that to influence her. He was the Dragon Reborn, now, the hope of the world and at the same time maybe the single greatest threat the world faced. Maybe? The Seanchan could not do as much damage as the Dragon Reborn. And she was going to use the possibility that he had Compelled sisters. The Amyrlin Seat really was a different woman from that innkeeper’s daughter.

  Scowling at the pewter cup of so-called tea, she picked it up and made herself drink the vile stuff down, gagging and spluttering the whole way. Perhaps the taste would take her mind off her headache, at least.

  As she set the cup down with a sharp clink of metal on wood, Anaiya pushed into the tent, mouth turned down and a frown creasing her plain face.

  “Akarrin and the others have returned, Mother,” she said. “Moria told me to inform you she has called the Hall to hear their report.”

  “So have Escaralde and Malind,” Morvrin announced, coming in behind Anaiya with Myrelle. The Green seemed an image of serene fury, if that was possible, her olive face smooth and her eyes like dark embers, but Morvrin wore a scowl to make Anaiya look pleased. “They’re sending novices and Accepted running to find all the Sitters,” the Brown said. “We can’t catch a whisper of what Akarrin found, but I think Escaralde and the others intend to use it to prod the Hall toward something.”

  Peering at the dark dregs floating in a few drops in the bottom of the pewter cup, Egwene sighed. She would have to be there, too, and now she would have to face the Sitters with a headache and that awful taste in her mouth. Perhaps she could call it a penance for what she was going to do to the Hall.

  CHAPTER

  19

  Surprises

  By custom, the Amyrlin was informed of the Hall sitting, yet nothing said they had to wait for her before starting the session, which meant that time might be short. Egwene wanted to leap to her feet and march straight to the big pavilion before Moria and the other two could spring whatever surprise they intended. Surprises in the Hall were seldom good. Surprises you learned about late were worse. Still, protocols that were law, not custom, had to be followed for the Amyrlin entering the Hall, so she remained where she was and sent Siuan to fetch Sheriam so she could be announced properly by the Keeper of the Chronicles. Siuan had told her that was really a matter of warning the Sitters of her presence—there were always matters they might want to discuss without the Amyrlin knowing—and she had not sounded entirely as if she were making a joke.

  In any case, there was no point in going to the Hall until she could enter. Tamping down her impatience, she propped her head on her hands and ma
ssaged her temples as she tried to read a little more of the Ajah reports. Despite the vile “tea,” or perhaps because of it, her headache made the words shimmer on the page every time she blinked, and Anaiya and the other two did not help.

  No sooner did Siuan depart than Anaiya tossed back her cloak, settling on the stool Siuan had vacated—it did not seem to lurch under her, uneven legs or no—and began to speculate on what Moria and the others were after. She was not a flighty woman, so her ventures were quite constrained given the circumstances. Constrained, but no less upsetting for that.

  “Frightened people do silly things, Mother, even Aes Sedai,” she murmured, placing her hands on her knees, “but at least you can be sure Moria will be firm about Elaida, at least in the long run. She lays every sister who died after Siuan was deposed right at Elaida’s feet. Moria wants Elaida birched for every single death before she goes to the headsman. A hard woman, harder than Lelaine in some ways. Tougher, anyway. She won’t scruple at things that might make Lelaine balk. I’m very much afraid she will press for an assault on the city as soon as possible. If the Forsaken are moving so openly, on such a scale, then better a wounded Tower that’s whole than a Tower divided. At least, I fear that’s how Moria may see things. After all, however much we want to avoid sisters killing sisters, it wouldn’t be the first time. The Tower has lasted a long time, and healed from many wounds. We can heal from this one, too.”

  Anaiya’s voice suited her face, warm and patient and comforting, but making those remarks it seemed like fingernails screeching down a slat. Light, for all Anaiya saying this was what she feared out of Moria, she seemed much in accord with the sentiments. She was deliberate, unflappable, and never careless with words. If she favored an assault, how many others did, too?

  As usual, Myrelle was anything but constrained. Mercurial and fiery described her best. She would not know patience if it bit her on the nose. She paced back and forth, as much as the confines of the tent allowed, kicking her deep-green skirts and sometimes kicking one of the bright cushions piled against the wall before turning to make another round. “If Moria is frightened enough to press for an assault, then she’s frightened out of her wits. A Tower too wounded to stand alone won’t be able to face the Forsaken or anyone else. Malind is who should concern you. She’s always pointing out that Tarmon Gai’don could be upon us any day. I’ve heard her say that what we felt could well have been the opening blows of the Last Battle. And that it might happen here, next. Where better for the Shadow to strike than Tar Valon? Malind has never been afraid to make hard choices, or to retreat when she thought it necessary. She would abandon Tar Valon and the Tower at once if she thought it would preserve at least some of us for Tarmon Gai’don. She will propose lifting the siege, fleeing somewhere the Forsaken can’t find us until we’re ready to strike back. If she puts the question to the Hall in the right way, she might even get the greater consensus in support.” The very thought made the words dance harder on the page in front of Egwene.

  Morvrin, her round face unrelenting, simply planted fists on ample hips and met each suggestion with a curt answer. “We don’t know enough yet to be sure it was the Forsaken,” and “You can’t know until she says.” “Perhaps it was, and perhaps not,” and “Supposition isn’t evidence.” It was said she would not believe it was morning till she saw the sun for herself. Her firm voice brooked no nonsense, especially jumps to conclusions. It was not soothing to an aching head, either. She was not opposing the suggestions, really, just keeping an open mind. An open mind could go either way when it came down to the sticking point.

  Egwene slapped the embossed folder shut on the reports with a loud smack. Between the disgusting taste on her tongue and the sharp throb in her head—not to mention their incessant voices!—she could not keep her place to read anyway. The three sisters looked at her in surprise. She had made it clear long ago that she was in charge, but she tried not to show temper. Oaths of fealty or no oaths of fealty, a young woman displaying temper was too easy to dismiss as sulky. Which only made her angrier, which made her head hurt more, which . . .

  “I’ve waited long enough,” she said, making an effort to keep her voice smooth. Her head gave it a slight edge of sharpness anyway. Perhaps Sheriam thought she was supposed to meet her at the Hall.

  Gathering her cloak, she strode out into the cold while still swinging it around her shoulders, and Morvrin and the other two hesitated only a moment before following in her wake. Accompanying her to the Hall might seem a little like they were her entourage, but they were supposed to be watching her, and she suspected that even Morvrin was eager to hear what Akarrin had to report and what Moria and the rest intended to fashion from it.

  Nothing too difficult to deal with, Egwene hoped, nothing like what Anaiya and Myrelle thought. If necessary, she could try applying the Law of War, but even if that was successful, ruling by edict had its disadvantages. When people had to obey you in one thing, they always found ways to wriggle away on others, and the more they were forced to obey, the more places they found for wriggling away. It was a natural balance you could not escape. Worse, she had learned just how addictive it was to have people jump when she spoke. You came to take it as the natural way of things, and then when they failed to jump, you were caught on the wrong foot. Besides, with her head pounding—it was pounding, now, not throbbing, though perhaps not as sharply—with her head, she was ready to snap at anyone who looked at her crosswise, and even when people had to swallow it, that never went down well.

  The sun stood straight overhead, a golden ball in a blue sky with a scattering of white clouds, but it gave no warmth, only wan shadows and a glitter to the snow wherever it remained untrampled. The air felt as chill as it had by the river. Egwene ignored the cold, refused to let it touch her, but only the dead could have been unaware, with everyone’s breath misting white in front of their faces. It was time for the midday meal, yet there was no possibility of feeding so many novices at once, so Egwene and her escort still moved through a wave of white-clad women leaping out of their way and starting to curtsy in the street. She set such a pace that they were usually past before the knots of novices could more than spread their skirts.

  It was not a long way, with only four places that they needed to wade across the muddy streets. There had been talk of wooden bridges, tall enough to ride under, but bridges suggested a permanence to the camp that no one wanted. Even the sisters who spoke of them never pressed to have them built. Which left wading slowly, and taking care to keep your skirts and cloak high if you were not to arrive filthy to your knees. At least the remaining crowds vanished as they approached the Hall. That stood alone as always, or nearly so.

  Nisao and Carlinya were already waiting in front of the big canvas pavilion with its patched side curtains, the tiny Yellow fretting her underlip with her teeth and eyeing Egwene anxiously. Carlinya was calmness itself, cool-eyed, hands folded at her waist. Except that she had forgotten her cloak, mud stained the scroll-embroidered hem of her pale skirt, and her cap of dark curls badly needed a comb. Making their courtesies, the pair joined Anaiya and the other two, a little distance behind Egwene. The lot of them murmured softly, the snatches that Egwene caught innocuous, about the weather, or how long they might have to wait. This was no place for them to seem too closely associated with her.

  Beonin came down the walk at a run, her hurried breath misting, and skidded to a halt, staring at Egwene before joining the others. The strain around her blue-gray eyes was even more apparent than earlier. Perhaps she thought this would affect her negotiations. But she knew the talks would be a sham, just a ploy to gain time. Egwene controlled her breathing and practiced novice exercises, yet none of it helped her head. It never did.

  There was no sign of Sheriam among the tents in any direction, but they were not precisely alone on the walkway outside the pavilion. Akarrin and the five other sisters who had gone with her, one from each Ajah, were waiting in a cluster on the other side of the entrance. Most
offered curtsies to Egwene distractedly, yet kept their distance. Perhaps they had been warned to say nothing to anyone until they spoke before the Hall. Egwene could simply have demanded their report on the spot, of course. They might even have given it, to the Amyrlin. Likely they would have. On the other hand, an Amyrlin’s relations with the Ajahs were always delicate, often including the Ajah she had been raised from. Nearly as delicate as relations with the Hall. Egwene made herself smile and bow her head graciously. If she gritted her teeth behind that smile, well, that helped keep her mouth shut.

  Not all of the sisters seemed aware of her presence. Akarrin, slender in plain brown wool and a cloak with surprisingly elaborate green embroidery, was staring at nothing, nodding to herself now and then. Apparently she was practicing what she would say inside. Akarrin was not strong in the Power, little more than Siuan if at all, but only one other of the six, Therva, a slim woman in yellow-slashed riding skirts and a cloak edged with yellow, stood even as high as she. That was a distressing measure of just how frightened the sisters were by that strange beacon of saidar. The strongest should have stepped forward for the task that had been given to these, but except for Akarrin herself, zeal had been notably lacking. Her companions still appeared less than enthusiastic. Shana normally maintained a deep reserve despite eyes that made her appear constantly startled, but now they seemed ready to come out of her head with worry. She peered at the entrance to the Hall, closed off by heavy flaps, and her hands fiddled with her cloak as if she could not keep them still. Reiko, a stout Arafellin Blue, kept her eyes down, but the silver bells in her long dark hair chimed faintly as if she were shaking her head inside her cowl. Only Therva’s long-nosed face wore a look of absolute serenity, completely unperturbed and unshakable, yet that in itself was a bad sign. The Yellow sister was excitable by nature. What had they seen? What were Moria and the other two Sitters after?