The Wheel of Time

by Robert Jordan

  “I’ve seen four other cats here, so far,” she said. “You have a problem with mice? Rats?”

  “Rats, Moiraine Sedai.” The innkeeper sighed. “A terrible problem. Not that I don’t keep a clean place, you understand. It’s all the people. The whole city is full of people and rats. But my cats take care of it. You’ll not be troubled, I promise.”

  Rand exchanged a fleeting look with Perrin, who put his eyes down again right away. There was something odd about Perrin’s eyes. And he was so silent; Perrin was almost always slow to speak, but now he was saying nothing at all. “It could be all the people,” he said.

  “With your permission, Master Gill,” Moiraine said, as if she took it for granted. “It is a simple matter to keep rats away from this street. With luck, the rats will not even realize they are being kept away.”

  Master Gill frowned at that last, but he bowed, accepting her offer. “If you are sure you don’t want to stay at the Palace, Aes Sedai.”

  “Where is Mat?” Nynaeve said suddenly. “She said he was here, too.”

  “Upstairs,” Rand said. “He’s . . . not feeling well.”

  Nynaeve’s head came up. “He’s sick? I’ll leave the rats to her, and I’ll attend to him. Take me to him now, Rand.”

  “All of you go up,” Moiraine said. “I will join you in a few minutes. We are crowding Master Gill’s kitchen, and it would be best if we could all be somewhere quiet for a time.” There was an undercurrent in her voice. Stay out of sight. The hiding is not done yet.

  “Come on,” Rand said. “We’ll go up the back way.”

  The Emond’s Field folk crowded after him to the back staircase, leaving the Aes Sedai and the Warder in the kitchen with Master Gill. He could not get over being back together. It was nearly as if he were home again. He could not stop grinning.

  The same relief, almost joyous, seemed to be affecting the others. They chuckled to themselves, and kept reaching out to grip his arm. Perrin’s voice seemed subdued, and he still kept his head down, but he began to talk as they climbed.

  “Moiraine said she could find you and Mat, and she did. When we rode into the city, the rest of us couldn’t stop staring—well, all except Lan, of course—all the people, the buildings, everything.” His thick curls swung as he shook his head in disbelief. “It’s all so big. And so many people. Some of them kept staring at us, too, shouting ‘Red or white?’ like it made some kind of sense.”

  Egwene touched Rand’s sword, fingering the red wrappings. “What does it mean?”

  “Nothing,” he said. “Nothing important. We’re leaving for Tar Valon, remember?”

  Egwene gave him a look, but she removed her hand from the sword and took up where Perrin had left off. “Moiraine didn’t look at anything any more than Lan did. She led us back and forth through all those streets so many times, like a dog hunting a scent, that I thought you couldn’t be here. Then, all of a sudden, she took off down a street, and the next thing I knew we were handing the horses to the stablemen and marching into the kitchen. She never even asked if you were here. Just told a woman who was mixing batter to go tell Rand al’Thor and Mat Cauthon that someone wanted to see them. And there you were”—she grinned—“like a ball popping into the gleeman’s hand out of nowhere.”

  “Where is the gleeman?” Perrin asked. “Is he with you?”

  Rand’s stomach lurched and the good feeling of having friends around him dimmed. “Thom’s dead. I think he’s dead. There was a Fade. . . .” He could not say any more. Nynaeve shook her head, muttering under her breath.

  The silence thickened around them, stifling the little chuckles, flattening the joy, until they reached the head of the stairs.

  “Mat’s not sick, exactly,” he said then. “It’s. . . . You’ll see.” He flung open the door to the room he shared with Mat. “Look who’s here, Mat.”

  Mat was still curled up in a ball on the bed, just as Rand had left him. He raised his head to stare at them. “How do you know they’re really who they look like?” he said hoarsely. His face was flushed, the skin tight and slick with sweat. “How do I know you’re who you look like?”

  “Not sick?” Nynaeve gave Rand a disdainful look as she pushed past him, already unslinging her bag from her shoulder.

  “Everybody changes,” Mat rasped. “How can I be sure? Perrin? Is that you? You’ve changed, haven’t you?” His laugh sounded more like a cough. “Oh, yes, you’ve changed.”

  To Rand’s surprise Perrin dropped onto the edge of the other bed with his head in hands, staring at the floor. Mat’s hacking laughter seemed to pierce him.

  Nynaeve knelt beside Mat’s bed and put a hand to his face, pushing up his headcloth. He jerked back from her with a scornful look. His eyes were bright and glazed. “You’re burning,” she said, “but you should not be sweating with this much fever.” She could not keep the worry out of her voice. “Rand, you and Perrin fetch some clean cloths and as much cool water as you can carry. I’ll bring your temperature down first, Mat, and—”

  “Pretty Nynaeve,” Mat spat. “A Wisdom isn’t supposed to think of herself as a woman, is she? Not a pretty woman. But you do, don’t you? Now. You can’t make yourself forget that you’re a pretty woman, now, and it frightens you. Everybody changes.” Nynaeve’s face paled as he spoke—whether with anger or something else, Rand could not tell. Mat gave a sly laugh, and his feverish eyes slid to Egwene. “Pretty Egwene,” he croaked. “Pretty as Nynaeve. And you share other things now, don’t you? Other dreams. What do you dream about now?” Egwene took a step back from the bed.

  “We are safe from the Dark One’s eyes for the time being,” Moiraine announced as she walked into the room with Lan at her heels. Her eyes fell on Mat as she stepped through the doorway, and she hissed as if she had touched a hot stove. “Get away from him!”

  Nynaeve did not move except for turning to stare at the Aes Sedai in surprise. In two quick steps Moiraine seized the Wisdom by the shoulders, hauling her across the floor like a sack of grain. Nynaeve struggled and protested, but Moiraine did not release her until she was well away from the bed. The Wisdom continued her protests as she got to her feet, angrily straightening her clothes, but Moiraine ignored her completely. The Aes Sedai watched Mat to the exclusion of everything else, eyeing him the way she would a viper.

  “All of you stay away from him,” she said. “And be quiet.”

  Mat stared back as intently as she. He bared his teeth in a silent, snarling rictus, and pulled himself into an ever tighter knot, but he never took his eyes from hers. Slowly she put one hand on him, lightly, on a knee drawn up to his chest. A convulsion shook him at her touch, a shudder of revulsion spasming through his entire body, and abruptly he pulled one hand out, slashing at her face with the ruby-hilted dagger.

  One minute Lan was in the doorway, the next he was at the bedside, as if he had not bothered with the intervening space. His hand caught Mat’s wrist, stopping the slash as if it had struck stone. Still Mat held himself in that tight ball. Only the hand with the dagger tried to move, straining against the Warder’s implacable grip. Mat’s eyes never left Moiraine, and they burned with hate.

  Moiraine also did not move. She did not flinch from the blade only inches from her face, as she had not when he first struck. “How did he come by this?” she asked in a steel voice. “I asked if Mordeth had given you anything. I asked, and I warned you, and you said he had not.”

  “He didn’t,” Rand said. “He. . . . Mat took it from the treasure room.”Moiraine looked at him, her eyes seeming to burn as much as Mat’s. He almost stepped back before she turned away again, back to the bed. “I didn’t know until after we were separated. I didn’t know.”

  “You did not know.” Moiraine studied Mat. He still lay with his knees pulled up to his chest, still snarled soundlessly at her, and his hand yet fought Lan to reach her with the dagger. “It is a wonder you got this far, carrying this. I felt the evil of it when I laid eyes on him, the touch of Mashadar,
but a Fade could sense it for miles. Even though he would not know exactly where, he would know it was near, and Mashadar would draw his spirit while his bones remembered that this same evil swallowed an army—Dreadlords, Fades, Trollocs, and all. Some Darkfriends could probably feel it, too. Those who have truly given away their souls. There could not help but be those who would wonder at suddenly feeling this, as if the very air around them itched. They would be compelled to seek it. It should have drawn them to it as a magnet draws iron filings.”

  “There were Darkfriends,” Rand said, “more than once, but we got away from them. And a Fade, the night before we reached Caemlyn, but he never saw us.” He cleared his throat. “There are rumors of strange things in the night outside the city. It could be Trollocs.”

  “Oh, it’s Trollocs, sheepherder,” Lan said wryly. “And where Trollocs are, there are Fades.” Tendons stood out on the back of his hand from the effort of holding Mat’s wrist, but there was no strain in his voice. “They’ve tried to hide their passage, but I have seen sign for two days. And heard farmers and villagers mutter about things in the night. The Myrddraal managed to strike into the Two Rivers unseen, somehow, but every day they come closer to those who can send soldiers to hunt them down. Even so, they won’t stop now, sheepherder.”

  “But we’re in Caemlyn,” Egwene said. “They can’t get to us as long as—”

  “They can’t?” the Warder cut her off. “The Fades are building their numbers in the countryside. That’s plain enough from the sign, if you know what to look for. Already there are more Trollocs than they need just to watch all the ways out of the city, a dozen fists, at least. There can only be one reason; when the Fades have enough numbers, they will come into the city after you. That act may send half the armies of the south marching to the Borderlands, but the evidence is that they’re willing to take that risk. You three have escaped them too long. It looks as if you’ve brought a new Trolloc War to Caemlyn, sheepherder.”

  Egwene gave a gasping sob, and Perrin shook his head as though to deny it. Rand felt a sickness in his stomach at the thought of Trollocs in the streets of Caemlyn. All those people at one another’s throats, never realizing the real threat waiting to come over the walls. What would they do when they suddenly found Trollocs and Fades in their midst, killing them? He could see the towers burning, flames breaking through the domes, Trollocs pillaging through the curving streets and vistas of the Inner City. The Palace itself in flames. Elayne, and Gawyn, and Morgase . . . dead.

  “Not yet,” Moiraine said absently. She was still intent on Mat. “If we can find a way out of Caemlyn, the Halfmen will have no more interest here. If. So many if’s.”

  “Better we were all dead,” Perrin said suddenly, and Rand jumped at the echo of his own thoughts. Perrin still sat staring at the floor—glaring at it now—and his voice was bitter. “Everywhere we go, we bring pain and suffering on our backs. It would be better for everyone if we were dead.”

  Nynaeve rounded on him, her face half fury and half worried fear, but Moiraine forestalled her.

  “What do you think to gain, for yourself or anyone else, by dying?” the Aes Sedai asked. Her voice was level, yet sharp. “If the Lord of the Grave has gained as much freedom to touch the Pattern as I fear, he can reach you dead more easily than alive, now. Dead, you can help no one, not the people who have helped you, not your friends and family back in the Two Rivers. The Shadow is falling over the world, and none of you can stop it dead.”

  Perrin raised his head to look at her, and Rand gave a start. The irises of his friend’s eyes were more yellow than brown. With his shaggy hair and the intensity of his gaze, there was something about him. . . . Rand could not grasp it enough to make it out.

  Perrin spoke with a soft flatness that gave his words more weight than if he had shouted. “We can’t stop it alive, either, now can we?”

  “I will have time to argue with you later,” Moiraine said, “but your friend needs me now.” She stepped aside so they could all see Mat clearly. His eyes still on her with a rage-filled stare, he had not moved or changed his position on the bed. Sweat stood out on his face, and his lips were bloodless in an unchanging snarl. All of his strength seemed to be pouring into the effort to reach Moiraine with the dagger Lan held motionless. “Or had you forgotten?”

  Perrin gave an embarrassed shrug and spread his hands wordlessly.

  “What’s wrong with him?” Egwene asked, and Nynaeve added, “Is it catching? I can still treat him. I don’t seem to catch sick, no matter what it is.”

  “Oh, it is catching,” Moiraine said, “and your . . . protection would not save you.” She pointed to the ruby-hilted dagger, careful not to let her finger touch it. The blade trembled as Mat strained to reach her with it. “This is from Shadar Logoth. There is not a pebble of that city that is not tainted and dangerous to bring outside the walls, and this is far more than a pebble. The evil that killed Shadar Logoth is in it, and in Mat, too, now. Suspicion and hatred so strong that even those closest are seen as enemies, rooted so deep in the bone that eventually the only thought left is to kill. By carrying the dagger beyond the walls of Shadar Logoth he freed it, this seed of it, from what bound it to that place. It will have waxed and waned in him, what he is in the heart of him fighting what the contagion of Mashadar sought to make him, but now the battle inside him is almost done, and he almost defeated. Soon, if it does not kill him first, he will spread that evil like a plague wherever he goes. Just as one scratch from that blade is enough to infect and destroy, so, soon, a few minutes with Mat will be just as deadly.”

  Nynaeve’s face had gone white. “Can you do anything?” she whispered.

  “I hope so.” Moiraine sighed. “For the sake of the world, I hope I am not too late.” Her hand delved into the pouch at her belt and came out with the silk-shrouded angreal. “Leave me. Stay together, and find somewhere you will not be seen, but leave me. I will do what I can for him.”

  CHAPTER

  42

  Remembrance of Dreams

  It was a subdued group that Rand led back down the stairs. None of them wanted to talk to him now, or to one another. He did not feel much like talking, either.

  The sun was far enough across the sky to dim the back stairwell, but the lamps had not yet been lit. Sunlight and shadow striped the stairs. Perrin’s face was as closed as the others, but where worry creased everyone else’s brow, his was smooth. Rand thought the look Perrin wore was resignation. He wondered why, and wanted to ask, but whenever Perrin walked through a deeper patch of shadow, his eyes seemed to gather in what little light there was, glowing softly like polished amber.

  Rand shivered and tried to concentrate on his surroundings, on the walnut paneled walls and the oak stair railing, on sturdy, everyday things. He wiped his hands on his coat several times, but each time sweat sprang out on his palms anew. It’ll all be all right, now. We’re together again, and. . . . Light, Mat.

  He took them to the library by the back way that went by the kitchens, avoiding the common room. Not many travelers used the library; most of those who could read stayed at more elegant inns in the Inner City. Master Gill kept it more for his own enjoyment than for the handful of patrons who wanted a book now and then. Rand did not want to think why Moiraine wanted them to keep out of sight, but he kept remembering the Whitecloak under-officer saying he would be back, and Elaida’s eyes when she asked where he was staying. Those were reasons enough, Whatever Moiraine wanted.

  He took five steps into the library before he realized that everyone else had stopped, crowded together in the doorway, openmouthed and goggling. A brisk blaze crackled in the fireplace, and Loial was sprawled on the long couch, reading, a small black cat with white feet curled and half asleep on his stomach. When they entered he closed the book with a huge finger marking his place and gently set the cat on the floor, then stood to bow formally.

  Rand was so used to the Ogier that it took him a minute to realize that Loial was the objec
t of the others’ stares. “These are the friends I was waiting for, Loial,” he said. “This is Nynaeve, the Wisdom of my village. And Perrin. And this is Egwene.”

  “Ah, yes,” Loial boomed, “Egwene. Rand has spoken of you a great deal. Yes. I am Loial.”

  “He’s an Ogier,” Rand explained, and watched their amazement change in kind. Even after Trollocs and Fades in the flesh, it was still astonishing to meet a legend walking and breathing. Remembering his own first reaction to Loial, he grinned ruefully. They were doing better than he had.

  Loial took their gaping in his stride. Rand supposed he hardly noticed it compared with a mob shouting “Trolloc.” “And the Aes Sedai, Rand?” Loial asked.

  “Upstairs with Mat.”

  The Ogier raised one bushy eyebrow thoughtfully. “Then he is ill. I suggest we all be seated. She will be joining us? Yes. Then there’s nothing to do but wait.”

  The act of sitting seemed to loosen some catch inside the Emond’s Field folk, as if being in a well-stuffed chair with a fire in the fireplace and a cat now curled up on the hearth made them feel at home. As soon as they were settled they excitedly began asking the Ogier questions. To Rand’s surprise, Perrin was the first to speak.

  “The stedding, Loial. Are they really havens, the way the stories say?” His voice was intent, as if he had a particular reason for asking.

  Loial was glad to tell about the stedding, and how he came to be at The Queen’s Blessing, and what he had seen in his travels. Rand soon leaned back, only partly listening. He had heard it all before, in detail. Loial liked to talk, and talk at length when he had the slightest chance, though he usually seemed to think a story needed two or three hundred years of background to make it understood. His sense of time was very strange; to him three hundred years seemed a reasonable length of time for a story or explanation to cover. He always talked about leaving the stedding as if it were just a few months before, but it had finally come out that he had been gone more than three years.