The Gathering Storm

by Robert Jordan

  “Natrin’s Barrow.”

  Rand exhaled softly, then released Kerb with an almost reverent motion. The youth slipped from the bench to the floor, spittle drooling from his lips onto the rug. Nynaeve cursed, leaping from her seat, then wobbling slightly as the room spun. Light, she was exhausted! She steadied herself, closed her eyes and took a few deep breaths. Then she knelt at the boy’s side.

  “You needn’t bother,” Rand said. “He is dead.”

  Nynaeve confirmed the death for herself. Then she snapped her head up, looking at Rand. What right did he have to look as exhausted as she felt? He had done barely anything! “What did you—”

  “I did nothing, Nynaeve. I suspect that once you removed that Compulsion, the only thing keeping him alive was his anger at Graendal, buried deeply. Whatever bit of himself remained, it knew the only help it could give were those two words. After that, he just let go. There was nothing more we could do for him.”

  “I don’t accept that,” Nynaeve said, frustrated. “He could have been Healed!” She should have been able to help him! Undoing Graendal’s Compulsion had felt so good, so right. It shouldn’t have ended this way!

  She shuddered, feeling dirtied. Used. How was she better than the jailer who had done such horrible things for information? She glared at Rand. He could have told her what removing Compulsion would do!

  “Don’t look at me like that, Nynaeve.” He walked to the door and gestured for the Maidens there to collect Kerb’s body. They did so, carrying it away as Rand called softly for a new pot of tea.

  He returned, sitting down on the bench beside the sleeping Min; she’d tucked one of the bench’s pillows under her head. One of the two lamps in the room was burning low, and that left his face half in shadow. “This was the only way it could have happened,” he continued. “The Wheel weaves as the Wheel wills. You are Aes Sedai. Is that not one of your creeds?”

  “I don’t know what it is,” Nynaeve snapped, “but it’s not an excuse for your actions.”

  “What actions?” he asked. “You brought this man to me. Graendal used Compulsion on him. Now I will kill her for it—that action will be my sole responsibility. Now, let me be. I shall try to go back to sleep.”

  “Don’t you feel any guilt at all?” she demanded.

  They locked eyes, Nynaeve frustrated and helpless, Rand. . . . Who could guess what Rand felt these days!

  “Should I suffer for them all, Nynaeve?” he asked quietly, rising, face still half in the darkness. “Lay this death at my feet, if you wish. It will just be one of many. How many stones can you pile on a man’s body before the weight stops mattering? How far can you burn a lump of flesh until further heat is irrelevant? If I let myself feel guilt for this boy, then I would need to feel guilt for the others. And it would crush me.”

  She regarded him in the half light. A king, certainly. A soldier, though he had only occasionally seen war. She forced down her anger. Hadn’t this all been about proving to him that he could trust her?

  “Oh, Rand,” she said, turning away. “This thing you have become, the heart without any emotion but anger. It will destroy you.”

  “Yes,” he said softly.

  She looked back at him, shocked.

  “I continue to wonder,” he said, glancing down at Min, “why you all assume that I am too dense to see what you find so obvious. Yes, Nynaeve. Yes, this hardness will destroy me. I know.”

  “Then why?” she asked. “Why won’t you let us help you?”

  He looked up—not at her, but staring off at nothing. A servant knocked quietly, wearing the white and forest green of Milisair’s house. She entered and deposited the new pot of tea, picked up the old one, then withdrew.

  “When I was much younger,” he said, voice soft, “Tam told me of a story he’d heard while traveling the world. He spoke of Dragonmount. I didn’t know at the time that he’d actually seen it, nor that he had found me there. I was just a shepherd boy, and Dragonmount, Tar Valon and Caemlyn were almost mythical places to me.

  “He told me of it, though, a mountain so high it made even Twinhorn’s Peak back home seem a dwarf. Tam’s stories claimed no man had ever climbed to Dragonmount’s peak. Not because it was impossible—but because reaching the top would take every last ounce of strength a man had. So tall was the mountain that besting it would be a struggle that drained a man completely.”

  He fell silent.

  “So?” Nynaeve finally asked.

  He looked at her. “Don’t you see? The stories claimed no man had climbed the mountain because in doing so, he would be without strength to return. A mountaineer could best it, reach the top, see what no man had ever seen. But then he would die. The strongest and wisest explorers knew this. So they never climbed it. They always wanted to, but they waited, reserving that trip for another day. For they knew it would be their last.”

  “But that’s just a story,” Nynaeve said. “A legend.”

  “That’s what I am,” Rand said. “A story. A legend. To be told to children years from now, spoken of in whispers.” He shook his head. “Sometimes, you can’t turn back. You have to keep pressing on. And sometimes, you know this climb is your last.

  “You all claim that I have grown too hard, that I will inevitably shatter and break if I continue on. But you assume that there needs to be something left of me to continue on. That I need to climb back down the mountain once I’ve reached the top.

  “That’s the key, Nynaeve. I see it now. I will not live through this, and so I don’t need to worry about what might happen to me after the Last Battle. I don’t need to hold back, don’t need to salvage anything of this beaten up soul of mine. I know that I must die. Those who wish for me to be softer, willing to bend, are those who cannot accept what will happen to me.” He looked down at Min again. Many times before, Nynaeve had seen affection in his eyes when he regarded her, but this time they were blank. Set in that same, emotionless face.

  “We can find a way, Rand,” Nynaeve said. “Surely there is a way to win but also let you live.”

  “No,” he growled softly. “Do not tempt me down that path again. It only leads to pain, Nynaeve. I . . . I used to think about leaving something behind to help the world survive once I died, but that was a struggle to keep living. I can’t indulge myself. I’ll climb this bloody mountain and face the sun. You all will deal with what comes next. That is how it must be.”

  She opened her mouth to object again, but he gave her a sharp glance. “That is how it must be, Nynaeve.”

  She closed her mouth.

  “You did well tonight,” Rand said. “You have saved us all a lot of trouble.”

  “I did it because I want you to trust me,” Nynaeve said, then immediately cursed herself. Why had she said that? Was she really so tired that she blabbed the first thing that came to her mind?

  Rand just nodded. “I do trust you, Nynaeve. As much as I trust anyone; more than I trust most. You think you know what is best for me, even against my wishes, but that is something I can accept. The difference between you and Cadsuane is that you actually care about me. She only cares about my place in her plans. She wants me to be part of the Last Battle. You want me to live. For that, you have my thanks. Dream on my behalf, Nynaeve. Dream for things I no longer can.”

  He leaned down to pick up Min; he managed it despite his missing hand, snaking one arm underneath her and gripping with his hand as he lifted her up. She stirred, then snuggled in close to him, waking and murmuring a complaint that she could walk. He didn’t put her down; perhaps because of the exhaustion in her voice. Nynaeve knew she stayed up with her books most nights, pushing herself almost as hard as Rand did.

  Carrying Min, he walked toward the door. “We will deal with the Seanchan first,” he said. “Be well prepared for that meeting. I will take care of Graendal soon after.”

  He left her then. The flickering lamp finally gave out, leaving only the one on the table.

  Rand had surprised her again. He was stil
l a wool-headed fool, but he was a surprisingly self-aware one. How could a man understand so much, yet still be so ignorant?

  And why couldn’t she come up with an argument against what he’d said? Why couldn’t she make herself yell at him that he was wrong? There was always hope. By surrendering that most important emotion, he might make himself strong—but risked losing all reason he might have to care about the outcome of his battles.

  For some reason, she couldn’t find words for the argument.

  CHAPTER 34

  Legends

  “All right,” Mat said, unrolling one of Roidelle’s best maps on his table. Talmanes, Thom, Noal, Juilin and Mandevwin had arranged their chairs around the table. Beside the map of the area, Mat unrolled a sketch of the layout of a medium-sized town. It had taken some doing to find a merchant willing to sketch them a map of Trustair, but after Hinderstap, Mat didn’t like to go into a town without knowing what they were up against.

  Mat’s pavilion was shaded by the pine forest outside, and the day was cool. Occasionally, the wind would blow, and a small sprinkle of dead pine needles would shake free from the boughs above and fall to the ground, some scratching the top of the tent as they fell. Outside, soldiers called to one another and pots clanged as the midday meal was distributed.

  Mat studied the town map. It was time to stop being a fool. The whole world had decided to turn against him—even rural mountain towns were death traps, these days. Next he knew, the daisies on the sides of the road would be ganging up to try and eat him.

  That thought gave him pause as he remembered the poor peddler, sinking into the phantom Shiotan town. When that ghostly place had vanished, it had left behind a meadow with butterflies and flowers. Including daisies. Burn me, he thought.

  Well, Matrim Cauthon wasn’t about to end up dead on some random backwater road. This time he would plan and he would be ready. He nodded to himself in satisfaction.

  “The inn is here,” Mat said, pointing at the town map. “The Shaken Fist. Two separate travelers agreed that it was a fine inn, the nicest of the three in the town. The woman looking for me hasn’t made any effort to hide her whereabouts, so that means she thinks that she is well protected. We can expect guards.”

  Mat pulled out another of Roidelle’s maps, one that better showed the geography around Trustair. The town sat in a small hollow, surrounded by gently rolling hills beside a small lake fed by highland springs. The lake reportedly produced some fine trout, the salting of which was the town’s main trade.

  “I want three squads of light cavalry here,” Mat said, pointing at an upper slope. “They’ll be hidden by the trees, but will have full view of the skies. If a red nightflower goes up, they’re to come in directly along the main road here for a rescue. We’ll have a hundred crossbowmen sequestered on either side of the town as a backup to the cavalry. If the nightflower is green instead, the cavalry is to march in and secure the main roads to the town, here, here and here.”

  Mat looked up, pointing at Thom. “Thom, you’ll take Harnan, Fergin and Mandevwin as ‘apprentices’ and Noal can be your footman.”

  “Footman?” Noal asked. He was a gnarled man, missing teeth, with a hooked beak of a nose. But he was tough as an old, battle-scored sword passed down from father to son. “Why does a gleeman need a footman?”

  “All right,” Mat said. “You can be his brother then, who doubles as a manservant. Juilin, you—”

  “Wait, Mat,” Mandevwin said, scratching his face near his eye patch. “I’m to be an apprentice gleeman? I’m not certain my voice is suited to fine singing. You’ve heard me, I warrant. And with only one eye, I doubt I’ll fare well at juggling.”

  “You’re a new apprentice,” Mat said. “Thom knows you don’t have any talent, but he took pity on you because your great-aunt—with whom you’ve lived since your parents died in a tragic oxen stampede—took sick of the clover pox and went crazy. She started feeding you table scraps and treated you like the family hound, Marks, who’d run away when you were just seven.”

  Mandevwin scratched his head. His hair was streaked with gray. “Aren’t I a little old to be an apprentice, though?”

  “Nonsense,” Mat said. “You’re young at heart, and since you never married—the only woman you ever loved ran away with the tanner’s son—Thom’s arrival offered you an opportunity to start fresh.”

  “But I don’t want to leave my great-aunt,” Mandevwin protested. “She’s cared for me since I was a child! It’s not honest of a man to abandon an elderly woman just because she gets a little confused.”

  “There is no great-aunt,” Mat said with exasperation. “This is just a legend, a story to go with your false name.”

  “Can’t I have a story that makes me more honorable?” Mandevwin asked.

  “Too late,” Mat said, rifling through a stack on his desk, searching out a cluster of five pages covered in scrawled handwriting. “You can’t change now. I spent half the night working on your story. It’s the best out of the lot. Here, memorize this.” He handed it over to Mandevwin, then got out another stack of papers and began looking through them.

  “Are you sure we’re not taking this a little too far, lad?” Thom asked.

  “I’m not going to be surprised again, Thom,” Mat said. “Burn me, but I’m not going to let it happen. I’m tired of walking into traps unprepared. I plan to take command of my own destiny, stop running from problem to problem. It’s time to be in charge.”

  “And you do that with . . .” Julin said.

  “Elaborate aliases with backstories,” Mat said, handing Thom and Noal their sheets. “Bloody right I do.”

  “What about me?” Talmanes asked. That twinkle to his eyes was back, though he spoke with a completely earnest voice. “Let me guess, Mat. I’m a traveling merchant who once trained with the Aiel and who has come to the village because he’s heard there’s a trout that lives in the lake who insulted his father.”

  “Nonsense,” Mat said, handing him his sheets. “You’re a Warder.”

  “That’s rather suspicious,” Talmanes noted.

  “You’re supposed to be suspicious,” Mat said. “It’s always easier to beat a man in cards when he’s thinking about something else. Well, you’ll be our ‘something else.’ A Warder passing through town on mysterious business won’t be so grand an event that it will draw too much attention, but to those who know what to look for, it will be a good distraction. You can use Fen’s cloak. He said he’d let me borrow it; he still feels guilty for letting those serving women get away.”

  “Of course, you didn’t tell him that they simply vanished,” Thom added. “And that there was no way for him to keep it from happening.”

  “Didn’t see the point of telling him,” Mat said. “No use dwelling on the past, I say.”

  “A Warder, is it?” Talmanes said, flipping through his stack of papers. “I’ll have to practice scowling.”

  Mat regarded him with a flat expression. “You’re not taking this seriously.”

  “What did you ask? Is there someone who is taking this seriously?” Burn that twinkle. Had Mat really ever thought this man was slow to laugh? He just did it on the inside. That was the most infuriating way.

  “Light, Talmanes,” Mat said. “A woman in that town is looking for Perrin and me. She knows what we look like so well that she can produce a drawing more accurate than my own mother could have made. That gives me a chill, like the Dark One himself standing over my shoulder. And I can’t go into the flaming place myself, since every bloody man, woman and child has a picture with my face on it and a promise of gold for information!

  “Now maybe I went a little far with the preparations, but I intend to find this person before they can order a flock of Darkfriends—or worse—to cut my throat in the night. Understood?”

  Mat looked each of the five men in the eyes, nodded, and started toward the tent flap, but paused beside Talmanes’s chair. Mat cleared his throat, then half mumbled, “You secretly harbo
r a love of painting, and you wish you could escape this life of death you’ve committed yourself to. You came through Trustair on your way south, rather than taking a more direct route, because you love the mountains. You’re hoping to hear word of your younger brother, whom you haven’t seen in years, and who disappeared on a hunting trip in southern Andor. You have a very tortured past. Read page four.”

  Mat hurried on, pushing his way out into the shaded noon, though he did catch a glimpse of Talmanes rolling his eyes. Burn the man! There was good drama in those pages!

  Through the pine trees he could see that the sky was cloudy. Again. When was that going to end? Mat shook his head as he walked through camp, nodding to the groups of soldiers who offered him salutes or calls of greeting to “Lord Mat.” The Band were staying here for the day—camped on a secluded, wooded hillside a half-day march from the town—while they made final preparations for the assault. The three-needle pines here were tall, and their limbs spread wide, the shade keeping underbrush to a minimum. Tents clustered in groups around the pines, and the air was cool and shaded, smelling of sap and loam.

  He went about the camp, checking into the workings of his men and seeing that everything was being handled efficiently. Those old memories, the ones that the Eelfinn had given him, had begun to blend so evenly with his own that he could hardly tell which instincts came from them and which were his own.

  It was good to be among the Band again; he hadn’t realized how much he’d missed them. It would be nice to reunite with the rest of the men, the troops led by Estean and Daerid. Hopefully, they’d had an easier time of it than Mat’s force had.

  The cavalry banners came first in his rounds. They were separate from the rest of the camp—horsemen always considered themselves superior to foot. Today, as all too often, the men were worried about feed for their horses. To a good cavalryman, his horse always came first. Their trip from Hinderstap had been hard on the animals, particularly since there wasn’t much to graze on. Little was growing this spring, and the winter’s leavings were strangely sparse. Horses would refuse patches of thatch, almost as if it had gone bad, like other food stores. They didn’t have much grain; they had hoped to live off the land, as they were moving too quickly for grain wagons.