Crossroads of Twilight

by Jordan, Robert

  Tarna certainly had never been nervous about men or very much of anything else, at least not since she reached the shawl just over twenty years ago. Pevara could remember a very jumpy novice, but the pale-haired woman’s blue eyes were steady as stones, now. And about as warm as stones in winter. Even so, there was something in that cool prideful face, something in the set of her mouth, that made her seem uneasy this morning. Pevara could hardly imagine what might make Tarna Feir nervous.

  The real question, though, was why the woman had come to see her. It bordered on impropriety for her to visit any Sitter privately, particularly a Red. Tarna still maintained her rooms here in the Red quarter, but so long as she held her new position, she was no longer part of the Red Ajah despite the crimson embroidery on her dark gray dress. Delaying the move to her new apartment might be taken as a show of delicacy, by those who did not know her.

  Anything out of the ordinary made Pevara wary since Seaine had pulled her into hunting the Black Ajah. And Elaida trusted Tarna, just as she had trusted Galina; it was wise to be very cautious with anyone Elaida trusted. Just thinking of Galina—the Light burn the woman forever!—still set Pevara’s teeth on edge, but there was a second connection. Galina had taken a special interest in Tarna as a novice, too. True, Galina had taken an interest in any novice or Accepted she thought might join the Red, but it was another reason for caution.

  Not that Pavara let anything show on her face, of course. She had been Aes Sedai too long for that. Smiling, she reached for the long-necked silver pitcher that sat on the tray giving off the sweet scent of spices. “Will you take wine, Tarna, in congratulation for being raised?”

  Silver goblets in hand, they settled on spiral-worked armchairs, a style that had gone out of fashion in Kandor near a hundred years ago, but one that Pevara liked. She saw no reason to change her furniture or anything else according to the whims of the moment. The chairs had served her since they were new-made, and they were comfortable with the addition of a few cushions. Tarna sat stiffly, however, on the edge of her seat. No one had ever called her languid, but clearly she was uneasy.

  “I am not certain congratulations are in order,” she said, fingering the narrow red stole draped around her neck. The exact shade was not prescribed, except that anyone who saw it must call the color red, and she had chosen a brilliant scarlet that nearly shone. “Elaida insisted, and I could not refuse. Much has changed since I left the Tower, inside as well as out. Alviarin made everyone . . . watchful . . . of the Keeper. I suspect some will want her birched, when she finally returns. And Elaida . . .” She paused to sip at her wine, but when she lowered the goblet, she went on in a different vein. “I have often heard you called unconventional. I have even heard that you once said you would like to have a Warder.”

  “I’ve been called worse than unconventional,” Pevara said dryly. What had the woman been about to say concerning Elaida? She sounded as though she would have refused the Keeper’s stole, given her wishes. Strange. Tarna was hardly shy or shrinking. Silence seemed best. Especially about Warders. She had been talking too much if that was general gossip. Besides, keep silent long enough, and the other woman always spoke if only to fill up the gap. You could learn a great deal through silence. She sipped her own wine slowly. There was too much honey in it for her taste, and not enough ginger.

  Still stiff, Tarna rose and strode to the fireplace, where she stood staring at the miniatures sitting on their white lacquered stands. She raised a hand to touch one of the ivory ovals, and Pevara felt her own shoulders tighten in spite of herself. Georg, her youngest brother, had been only twelve when he died, when all of the people in those paintings died, in an uprising by Darkfriends. They had not been a family who could afford ivory miniatures, but once she had the coin, she found a painter who could capture her memories. A beautiful boy, Georg, tall for his years and utterly fearless. Long after the event, she had learned how her baby brother died. With a knife in his hand, standing over their father’s body and trying to keep the mob from their mother. So many years ago, now. They would all have been long dead in any case, and their children’s children’s children, as well. But some hatreds never died.

  “The Dragon Reborn is ta’veren, so I have heard,” Tarna said finally, still staring at Georg’s picture. “Do you think he alters chance everywhere? Or do we change the future by ourselves, one step following another until we find ourselves somewhere we never expected?”

  “What do you mean?” Pevara said, a trifle more curtly than she could have wished. She did not like the other woman peering at her brother’s image so intently while talking of a man who could channel, even if he was the Dragon Reborn. She bit her lip so as not to tell Tarna to turn around and look at her. You could not read someone’s back the way you could a face.

  “I anticipated no great difficulty in Salidar. No great success, either, but what I found . . .” Was that a shake of her head, or had she merely changed the angle at which she was peering at the miniature? She spoke slowly, but with an undercurrent of remembered urgency. “I left a pigeon-handler a day outside the village, yet it took me less than half a day to get back to her, and after I loosed the birds with copies of my report, I pressed on so hard I had to pay the woman off because she could not keep up. I can hardly say how many horses I went through. Sometimes, the animal was spent to the point I had to show my ring to make a stable take it in trade, even with silver added. And because I pressed so hard, I happened to reach a village in Murandy while a . . . recruiting party . . . was there. If I had not been frightened out of my wits for the Tower by what I saw in Salidar, I would have ridden to Ebou Dar and taken ship for Illian and then upriver, but the thought of going south instead of north, the thought of waiting for a vessel, sent me like an arrow toward Tar Valon. So I was in that village to see them.”

  “Who, Tarna?”

  “Asha’man.” The woman did turn then. Her eyes were still blue ice, but tight. She held her goblet in both hands as if trying to soak in the warmth. “I did not know what they were then, of course, but they were openly recruiting men to follow the Dragon Reborn, and it seemed wisest to listen before I spoke. Well for me that I did. There were six of them, Pevara, six men in black coats. Two with silver swords on their collars were feeling men out about whether they might like to learn to channel. Oh, they did not say so right out. Wield the lightnings, they called it. Wield the lightnings and ride the thunder. But it was clear enough to me, if not to the fools they were talking to.”

  “Yes; very well for you that you kept silent,” Pevara said quietly. “Six men who can channel would be more than merely dangerous for a sister by herself. Our eyes-and-ears are full of talk about these recruiting parties—they appear everywhere from Saldaea to Tear—but no one seems to have an idea of how to stop them. If it isn’t too late for that already.” She very nearly bit her lip again. That was the trouble with talking. Sometimes, you said more than you wanted.

  Oddly, the comment took some of the stiffness out of Tarna. She resumed her seat, leaning back, though a hint of wariness still clung to the way she held herself. She chose her words carefully, pausing to touch the wine to her lips, but she did not actually drink, that Pevara saw. “I had a long time to think on the rivership coming north. Longer, after the fool captain ran us aground so hard he broke a mast and put a hole in the hull. Days trying to hail another ship, after we got ashore, and days finding a horse. Six of those men sent to one village convinced me, finally. Oh, the district around, as well, but it was not very populous. I . . . I believe it is too late.”

  “Elaida thinks they can all be gentled,” Pevara said noncommittally. She had already exposed herself too much.

  “When they can send six to one small village, and Travel? There is only one answer I can see. We . . .” Tarna took a deep breath, fingering the bright red stole again, but now it seemed more in regret than to play for time. “Red sisters must take them as Warders, Pevara.”

  That was so startling that Pevara b
linked. A hair less self-control, and she would have gaped. “Are you serious?”

  Those icy blue eyes met her gaze steadily. The worst was past—the unthinkable spoken aloud— and Tarna was a woman of stone once more. “This is hardly a matter for joking. The only other choice is to let them run loose. Who else can do it? Red sisters are used to facing men like this, and ready to take the necessary risks. Anyone else will flinch. Each sister will have to take more than one, but Greens appear to manage well enough with that. I think the Greens will faint if this is suggested to them, though. We . . . Red sisters . . . must do what needs to be done.”

  “Have you broached this to Elaida?” Pevara asked, and Tarna shook her head impatiently.

  “Elaida believes as you said. She . . .” The yellow-haired woman frowned into her wine before going on. “Elaida often believes what she wants to believe and sees what she wants to see. I tried to bring up the Asha’man the first day I was back. Not to suggest bonding; not to her. I am not a fool. She forbade me to mention them to her. But you are . . . unconventional.”

  “And do you believe they can be gentled after they’re bonded? I have no idea what that would do to the sister holding the bond, and in truth, I don’t want to learn.” She was the one playing for time, Pevara realized. She had had no idea where this interview was headed when it began, but she would have wagered everything she owned against it coming to this.

  “That might be the end, and it might prove impossible,” the other woman replied coolly. The woman was stone. “Either way, I can see no other way to handle these Asha’man. Red sisters must bond them as Warders. If there is any way, I will be among the first, but it must be done.”

  She sat there, calmly sipping her wine, and for a long time, Pevara could only stare at her in consternation. Nothing Tarna had said proved she was not Black Ajah, yet she could not distrust every sister unable to prove that. Well, she could and did, when it came to matters of the Black, but there were other matters she had to deal with. She was a Sitter, not simply a hunting dog. She had the White Tower to think of, and Aes Sedai far from the Tower. And the future.

  Dipping her fingers into her embroidered belt pouch, she drew out a small piece of paper rolled into a thin tube. It seemed to her that it should glow with letters of fire. So far, she was one of two women in the Tower who knew what was written there. Even once she had it out, she hesitated before handing it to Tarna. “This came from one of our agents in Cairhien, but it was sent by Toveine Gazal.”

  Tarna’s eyes jerked to Pevara’s face at the mention of Toveine’s name, then fell to reading again. Her stony face did not change even after she finished and let the paper roll back into a tube in her hand. “This changes nothing,” she said flatly. Coldly. “It only makes what I suggest more urgent.”

  “On the contrary,” Pevara sighed. “That changes everything. It changes the whole world.”

  CHAPTER

  23

  Ornaments

  The air in the room was just sufficiently warmer than outside to put a mist on the glass panes set in the red-painted casements, and the glass contained bubbles besides, but Cadsuane stood peering out as if she could see the dreary landscape clearly. She could see with more than enough clarity, in any case. A few hapless folk, bundled and hatted and only shapeless skirts or baggy breeches distinguishing men from women, were trudging the muddy fields that surrounded the manor house, sometimes stooping to feel a handful of the soil. It would not be long before they could begin their plowing and manuring, but only their inspection indicated the coming of spring any time soon. Beyond the fields, the forest was all dark bare branches against a washed-out gray morning sky. A good coating of snow would have made the view much less bleak, but it snowed lightly and seldom here, with traces of one fall rarely lasting until the next. Still, she could think of few places better for her purposes, with the Spine of the World little more than a day’s hard ride to the east. Who would think to look inside the borders of Tear? Had convincing the boy to stay here been too easy, though? With a sigh, she turned from the window, feeling the golden ornaments hanging in her hair sway, the small moons and stars, birds and fish. She was very aware of them, of late. Aware? Phaw! Of late, she had considered sleeping with them in place.

  The sitting room was large but not ornate, like the manor house itself, with cornices of carved wood, painted red. The furniture was bright with paint but not a touch of gilding, the two long fireplaces plain stone if well made, the andirons sturdy wrought metal made for long service rather than appearances. The fires on the hearths were small, at her insistence, the flames flickering low on half-consumed splits, but either was enough to warm her hands, which was all she wanted. Left to his own devices, Algarin would have surrounded her with blazing warmth and smothered her in servants, few as he still employed. A lesser Lord of the Land, he was far from wealthy, yet he paid his debts in letter and spirit, even when most other men would have seen quite the reverse of a debt.

  The uncarved door to the hall creaked open—most of Algarin’s servants were nearly as old as he, and though they kept everything dusted and neat, the lamps topped with oil and the wicks trimmed, hinges in the manor seemed to escape regular oiling—the door creaked open to admit Verin, still dressed for a journey in simple brown wool with divided skirts and carrying her cloak over her arm, still patting her gray-streaked hair into place. The stout little sister’s square face wore a vexed expression, and she was shaking her head. “Well, the Sea Folk are delivered to Tear, Cadsuane. I didn’t go near the Stone, but I heard that High Lord Astoril stopped complaining about his creaking joints and mustered inside with Darlin. Who’d have thought Astoril would stir himself, and on Darlin’s side? The streets are full of armsmen, most getting drunk and picking fights with each other when they’re not fighting Atha’an Miere. There are as many Sea Folk in the city as everyone else put together. Harine was aghast. She went rushing out to the ships as soon as she could hire a boat, expecting to be declared Mistress of the Ships and set everything to rights. There seems no doubt that Nesta din Reas is dead.”

  Cadsuane was content to let the round little woman chatter on. Verin was not nearly so vague as she pretended. Some Browns really were capable of tripping over their own feet from not noticing them, but Verin was one of those who wore an assumed cloak of unworldliness. She seemed to believe that Cadsuane accepted the cloak for reality, yet if there was a point to be made, she would make it. And what she left out might be revealing, too. Cadsuane was less sure of the other sister than she might have wished. Uncertainty was a fact of life, but she was uncertain about entirely too many things to suit her.

  Unfortunately, Min must have been listening at the door, and that young woman had little patience. “I told Harine it wouldn’t be like that,” she protested, bursting into the room. “I told her she’d be punished for the bargain she made with Rand. Only after that will she become Mistress of the Ships, and I can’t say if it will be ten days from now or ten years.” Slim and pretty, and tall in her red-heeled boots, with dark ringlets hanging to her shoulders, Min had a low womanly voice, but she wore a boy’s red coat and blue breeches. The coat was embroidered with colorful flowers on the lapels and up the sleeves, and the breeches in bands down the outsides of the legs, but they were still coat and breeches.

  “You may come in, Min,” Cadsuane said quietly. It was a tone that usually made people sit up and take notice. Those who knew her at all, anyway. Spots of color appeared in Min’s cheeks. “The Wavemistress has already learned all she is going to from your viewing, I fear. But from your urgency, perhaps you’ve read someone else’s auras and wish to tell me what you saw?” The girl’s peculiar ability had proved helpful in the past and doubtless could again. Perhaps. As far as Cadsuane could tell, she did not lie about what she saw in the images and auras that she perceived floating around people, but she was not always forthcoming, either. Particularly not when it came to the one person Cadsuane would have liked to know about above all others.r />
  Red cheeks or no red cheeks, Min raised her chin stubbornly. She had changed since Shadar Logoth, or perhaps it had begun earlier, but either way, the change was not for the better. “Rand wants you to come see him. He said to ask, so you needn’t get snippy over it.”

  Cadsuane merely looked at her and let the silence stretch. Snippy? Definitely not for the better. “Tell him I will come when I am able,” she said finally. “Close the door firmly behind you, Min.” The young woman opened her mouth as if to say something more, but at least she retained sense enough to leave it unsaid. She even made a passable curtsy, in spite of those ridiculous boots, and shut the door firmly behind her. Just barely short of slamming it, in fact.

  Verin shook her head again, giving a laugh that sounded only slightly amused. “She’s in love with the young man, Cadsuane, and she’s tucked her heart in his pocket. She’ll follow that before her head, whatever you say or do. I think she’s afraid he almost died on her, and you know how that can make a woman determined to hang on.”

  Cadsuane’s lips thinned. Verin knew more about that sort of relations with men than she did—she had never believed in indulging with her own Warders, as some Greens did, and other men had always been out of the question—but the Brown had hit close to a truth without knowing. At least, Cadsuane did not think the other sister knew Min was bonded to the al’Thor boy. She herself only knew because the girl had let too much slip in a careless moment. Even the tightest mussel eventually yielded its meat once you got that first small crack in the shell. Sometimes it gave up an unexpected pearl, as well. Yes, Min would want to keep the lad alive whether she loved him or not, but no more than Cadsuane did.