The Wheel of Time

by Robert Jordan

  “The curtains in the windows,” Egwene said patiently. “They look too light for winter curtains, even here. As cold as it is here, no woman would have had those up more than a week or two, maybe less.” The Wisdom nodded.

  “Curtains.” Perrin chuckled. He immediately wiped the smile off his face when the two women raised their eyebrows at him. “Oh, I agree with you. There wasn’t enough rust on that scythe for any more than a week in the open. You should have seen that, Mat. Even if you missed the curtains.”

  Rand glanced sideways at Perrin, trying not to stare. His eyes were sharper than Perrin’s—or had been, when they used to hunt rabbits together—but he had not been able to see that scythe-blade well enough to make out any rust.

  “I really don’t care where they went,” Mat grumbled. “I just want to find someplace with a fire. Soon.”

  “But why did they go?” Rand said under his breath. The Blight was not far off here. The Blight, where all the Fades and Trollocs were, those not down in Andor chasing them. The Blight, where they were going.

  He raised his voice enough to be heard by those close to him. “Nynaeve, maybe you and Egwene don’t have to go to the Eye with us.” The two women looked at him as if he were speaking gibberish, but with the Blight so close he had to make one last try. “Maybe it’s enough for you to be close. Moiraine didn’t say you have to go. Or you, Loial. You could stay at Fal Dara. Until we come back. Or you could start for Tar Valon. Maybe there’ll be a merchant train, or I’ll bet Moiraine would even hire a coach. We will meet in Tar Valon, when it’s all over.”

  “Ta’veren.” Loial’s sigh was a rumble like thunder on the horizon. “You swirl lives around you, Rand al’Thor, you and your friends. Your fate chooses ours.” The Ogier shrugged, and suddenly a broad grin split his face. “Besides, it will be something to meet the Green Man. Elder Haman always talks about his meeting with the Green Man, and so does my father, and most of the Elders.”

  “So many?” Perrin said. “The stories say the Green Man is hard to find, and no one can find him twice.”

  “Not twice, no,” Loial agreed. “But then, I have never met him, and neither have you. He doesn’t seem to avoid Ogier quite the way he does you humans. He knows so much about trees. Even the Tree Songs.”

  Rand said, “The point I was trying to make is—”

  The Wisdom cut him off. “She says Egwene and I are part of the Pattern, too. All woven in with you three. If she is to be believed, there’s something about the way that piece of the Pattern is woven that might stop the Dark One. And I am afraid I do believe her; too much has happened not to. But if Egwene and I go away, what might we change about the Pattern?”

  “I was only trying to—”

  Again Nynaeve interrupted, sharply. “I know what you were trying to do.” She looked at him until he shifted uneasily in his saddle, then her face softened. “I know what you were trying to do, Rand. I have little liking for any Aes Sedai, and this one least of all, I think. I have less for going into the Blight, but least of all is the liking I have for the Father of Lies. If you boys . . . you men, can do what has to be done when you’d rather do almost anything else, why do you think I will do less? Or Egwene?” She did not appear to expect an answer. Gathering her reins, she frowned toward the Aes Sedai up ahead. “I wonder if we’re going to reach this Fal Dara place soon, or does she mean us to spend the night out in this?”

  As she trotted toward Moiraine, Mat said, “She called us men. It seems like only yesterday she was saying we shouldn’t be off leading strings, and now she calls us men.”

  “You still shouldn’t be off your mother’s apron strings,” Egwene said, but Rand did not think her heart was in it. She moved Bela close to his bay, and lowered her voice so none of the others could hear although Mat, at least, tried. “I only danced with Aram, Rand,” she said softly, not looking at him. “You wouldn’t hold it against me, dancing with somebody I will never see again, would you?”

  “No,” he told her. What had made her bring it up now? “Of course not.” But suddenly he remembered something Min had said in Baerlon, what seemed a hundred years ago. She’s not for you, nor you for her; at least, not in the way you both want.

  The town of Fal Dara was built on hills higher than the surrounding country. It was nowhere near as big as Caemlyn, but the wall around it was as high as Caemlyn’s. For a full mile outside that wall in every direction the ground was clear of anything taller than grass, and that cut low. Nothing could come close without being seen from one of the many tall towers topped by wooden hoardings. Where the walls of Caemlyn had a beauty about them, the builders of Fal Dara seemed not to have cared if anyone found their wall beautiful. The gray stone was grimly implacable, proclaiming that it existed for one purpose alone: to hold. Pennants atop the hoardings whipped in the wind, making the stooping Black Hawk of Shienar seem to fly all along the walls.

  Lan tossed back the hood of his cloak and, despite the cold, motioned for the others to do the same. Moiraine had already lowered hers. “It’s the law in Shienar,” the Warder said. “In all the Borderlands. No one may hide his face inside a town’s walls.”

  “Are they all that good-looking?” Mat laughed.

  “A Halfman can’t hide with his face exposed,” the Warder said in a flat voice.

  Rand’s grin slid off his face. Hastily Mat pushed back his hood.

  The gates stood open, tall and covered with dark iron, but a dozen armored men stood guard in golden yellow surcoats bearing the Black Hawk. The hilts of long swords on their backs peeked over their shoulders, and broadsword or mace or axe hung at every waist. Their horses were tethered nearby, made grotesque by the steel bardings covering chests and necks and heads, with lances to stirrup, all ready to ride at an instant. The guards made no move to stop Lan and Moiraine and the others. Indeed, they waved and called out happily.

  “Dai Shan!” one cried, shaking steel-gauntleted fists over his head as they rode past. “Dai Shan!”

  A number of others shouted, “Glory to the Builders!” and, “Kiserai ti Wansho!” Loial looked surprised, then a broad smile split his face and he waved to the guards.

  One man ran alongside Lan’s horse a little way, unhampered by the armor he wore. “Will the Golden Crane fly again, Dai Shan?”

  “Peace, Ragan,” was all the Warder said, and the man fell away. He returned the guards’ waves, but his face was suddenly even more grim.

  As they rode through stone-paved streets crowded with people and wagons, Rand frowned worriedly. Fal Dara was bulging at the seams, but the people were neither the eager crowds of Caemlyn, enjoying the grandeur of the city even as they squabbled, nor the milling throngs of Baerlon. Packed cheek by jowl, these folk watched their party ride by with leaden eyes and faces blanked of emotion. Carts and wagons jammed every alleyway and half the streets, piled high with jumbled household furnishings, and carved chests packed so tight that clothes spilled. On top sat the children. Adults kept the younglings up where they could be seen and did not let them stray even to play. The children were even more silent than their elders, their eyes bigger, more haunting in their stares. The nooks and crannies between the wagons were filled with shaggy cattle and black-spotted pigs in makeshift pens. Crates of chickens and ducks and geese fitfully made up for the silence of the people. He knew now where all the farmers had gone.

  Lan led the way to the fortress in the middle of the town, a massive stone pile atop the highest hill. A dry moat, deep and wide, its bottom a forest of sharp steel spikes, razor-edged and as tall as a man, surrounded the towered walls of the keep. A place for a last defense, if the rest of the town fell. From one of the gate towers an armored man called down, “Welcome, Dai Shan.” Another shouted to the inside of the fortress, “The Golden Crane! The Golden Crane!”

  Their hooves drummed on the heavy timbers of the lowered drawbridge as they crossed the moat and rode under the sharp points of the stout portcullis. Once through the gates, Lan swung down out of h
is saddle to lead Mandarb, signaling the others to dismount.

  The first courtyard was a huge square paved with big stone blocks and surrounded by towers and battlements as fierce as those on the outside of the walls. As big as it was, the courtyard appeared just as crowded as the streets, and as much in turmoil, though there was an order to the crowding here. Everywhere were armored men and armored horses. At half a dozen smithies around the court, hammers clanged, and big bellows, tugged by two leather-aproned men apiece, made the forge-fires roar. A steady stream of boys ran with new-made horse shoes for the farriers. Fletchers sat making arrows, and every time a basket was filled it was whisked away and replaced with an empty one.

  Liveried grooms appeared on the run, eager and smiling in black-and-gold. Rand hastily untied his belongings from behind the saddle and gave the bay up to one of the grooms as a man in plate-and-mail and leather bowed formally. He wore a bright yellow cloak edged in red over his armor, with the Black Hawk on the breast, and a yellow surcoat bearing a gray owl. He wore no helmet and was bareheaded, truly, for his hair had all been shaved except for a topknot tied with a leather cord. “It has been long, Moiraine Aes Sedai. It is good to see you, Dai Shan. Very good.” He bowed again, to Loial, and murmured, “Glory to the Builders. Kiserai ti Wansho.”

  “I am unworthy,” Loial replied formally, “and the work small. Tsingu ma choba.”

  “You honor us, Builder,” the man said. “Kiserai ti Wansho.” He turned back to Lan. “Word was sent to Lord Agelmar, Dai Shan, as soon as you were seen coming. He is waiting for you. This way, please.”

  As they followed him into the fortress, along drafty stone corridors hung with colorful tapestries and long silk screens of hunting scenes and battles, he continued. “I am glad the call reached you, Dai Shan. Will you raise the Golden Crane banner once more?” The halls were stark except for the wall hangings, and even they used the fewest figures made with the fewest lines necessary to convey meaning, though in bright colors.

  “Are things really as bad as they appear, Ingtar?” Lan asked quietly. Rand wondered if his own ears were twitching like Loial’s.

  The man’s topknot swayed as he shook his head, but he hesitated before putting on a grin. “Things are never as bad as they appear, Dai Shan. A little worse than usual this year, that is all. The raids continued through the winter, even in the hardest of it. But the raiding was no worse than anywhere else along the Border. They still come in the night, but what else can be expected in the spring, if this can be called spring. Scouts return from the Blight—those who do come back—with news of Trolloc camps. Always fresh news of more camps. But we will meet them at Tarwin’s Gap, Dai Shan, and turn them back as we always have.”

  “Of course,” Lan said, but he did not sound certain.

  Ingtar’s grin slipped, but came back immediately. Silently he showed them into Lord Agelmar’s study, then claimed the press of his duties and left.

  It was a room as purpose-made as all the rest of the fortress, with arrowslits in the outer wall and a heavy bar for the thick door, which had its own arrowpiercings and was bound by iron straps. Only one tapestry hung here. It covered an entire wall and showed men, armored like the men of Fal Dara, fighting Myrddraal and Trollocs in a mountain pass.

  A table, one chest, and a few chairs were the only furnishings except for two racks on the wall, and they caught Rand’s eye as much as the tapestry. One held a two-handed sword, taller than a man, a more ordinary broadsword, and below them a studded mace and a long, kite-shaped shield bearing three foxes. From the other hung a suit of armor, complete and arranged as one would wear it. Crested helmet with its barred faceguard over a double-mail camail. Mail hauberk, split for riding, and leather undercoat, polished from wear. Breastplate, steel gauntlets, knee and elbow cops, and half-plate for shoulders and arms and legs. Even here in the heart of the Keep, weapons and armor seemed ready to be donned at any moment. Like the furniture, they were simply and severely decorated with gold.

  Agelmar himself rose at their entrance and came around the table, littered with maps and sheafs of paper and pens standing in inkpots. He seemed at first glance too peaceful for the room in his blue velvet coat with its tall, wide collar, and soft leather boots, but a second look showed Rand differently. Like all the fighting men he had seen, Agelmar’s head was shaved except for a topknot, and that pure white. His face was as hard as Lan’s, the only lines creases at the corners of his eyes, and those eyes like brown stone, though they bore a smile now.

  “Peace, but it is good to see you, Dai Shan,” the Lord of Fal Dara said. “And you, Moiraine Aes Sedai, perhaps even more. Your presence warms me, Aes Sedai.”

  “Ninte calichniye no domashita, Agelmar Dai Shan,” Moiraine replied formally, but with a note in her voice that said they were old friends. “Your welcome warms me, Lord Agelmar.”

  “Kodome calichniye ga ni Aes Sedai hei. Here is always a welcome for Aes Sedai.” He turned to Loial. “You are far from the stedding, Ogier, but you honor Fal Dara. Always glory to the Builders. Kiserai ti Wansho hei.”

  “I am unworthy,” Loial said, bowing. “It is you who do me honor.” He glanced at the stark stone walls and seemed to struggle with himself. Rand was glad the Ogier managed to refrain from adding further comment.

  Servants in black-and-gold appeared on silent, soft-slippered feet. Some brought folded cloths, damp and hot, on silver trays for wiping the dust from faces and hands. Others bore mulled wine and silver bowls of dried plums and apricots. Lord Agelmar gave orders for rooms to be prepared, and baths.

  “A long journey from Tar Valon,” he said. “You must be tired.”

  “A short journey the path we came,” Lan told him, “but more tiring than the long way.”

  Agelmar looked puzzled when the Warder said no more, but he merely said, “A few days’ rest will put you all in fine fettle.”

  “I ask one night’s shelter, Lord Agelmar,” Moiraine said, “for ourselves and our horses. And fresh supplies in the morning, if you can spare them. We must leave you early, I am afraid.”

  Agelmar frowned. “But I thought. . . . Moiraine Sedai, I have no right to ask it of you, but you would be worth a thousand lances in Tarwin’s Gap. And you, Dai Shan. A thousand men will come when they hear the Golden Crane flies once more.”

  “The Seven Towers are broken,” Lan said harshly, “and Malkier is dead; the few of her people left, scattered across the face of the earth. I am a Warder, Agelmar, sworn to the Flame of Tar Valon, and I am bound into the Blight.”

  “Of course, Dai Sh—Lan. Of course. But surely a few days’ delay, a few weeks at most, will make no difference. You are needed. You, and Moiraine Sedai.”

  Moiraine took a silver goblet from one of the servants. “Ingtar seems to believe you will defeat this threat as you have defeated many others across the years.”

  “Aes Sedai,” Agelmar said wryly, “if Ingtar had to ride alone to Tarwin’s Gap, he would ride the whole way proclaiming that the Trollocs would be turned back once more. He has almost pride enough to believe he could do it alone.”

  “He is not as confident as you think, this time, Agelmar.” The Warder held a cup, but he did not drink. “How bad is it?”

  Agelmar hesitated, pulling a map from the tangle on the table. He stared unseeing at the map for a moment, then tossed it back. “When we ride to the Gap,” he said quietly, “the people will be sent south to Fal Moran. Perhaps the capital can hold. Peace, it must. Something must hold.”

  “That bad?” Lan said, and Agelmar nodded wearily.

  Rand exchanged worried looks with Mat and Perrin. It was easy to believe the Trollocs gathering in the Blight were after him, after them. Agelmar went on grimly.

  “Kandor, Arafel, Saldaea—the Trollocs raided them all straight through the winter. Nothing like that has happened since the Trolloc Wars; the raids have never been so fierce, or so large, or pressed home so hard. Every king and council is sure a great thrust is coming out of the Blight
, and every one of the Borderlands believes it is coming at them. None of their scouts, and none of the Warders, report Trolloc massing above their borders, as we have here, but they believe, and each is afraid to send fighting men elsewhere. People whisper that the world is ending, that the Dark One is loose again. Shienar will ride to Tarwin’s Gap alone, and we will be outnumbered at least ten to one. At least. It may be the last Ingathering of the Lances.

  “Lan—no!—Dai Shan, for you are a Diademed Battle Lord of Malkier Whatever you say. Dai Shan, the Golden Crane banner in the van would put heart into men who know they are riding north to die. The word will spread like wildfire, and though their kings have told them to hold where they are, lances will come from Arafel and Kandor, and even from Saldaea. Though they cannot come in time to stand with us in the Gap, they may save Shienar.”

  Lan peered into his wine. His face did not change, but wine slopped over his hand; the silver goblet crumpled in his grip. A servant took the ruined cup and wiped the Warder’s hand with a cloth; a second put a fresh goblet in his hand while the other was whisked away. Lan did not seem to notice. “I cannot!” he whispered hoarsely. When he raised his head his blue eyes burned with a fierce light, but his voice was calm again, and flat. “I am a Warder, Agelmar.” His sharp gaze slid across Rand and Mat and Perrin to Moiraine. “At first light I ride to the Blight.”

  Agelmar sighed heavily. “Moiraine Sedai, will you not come, at least? An Aes Sedai could make the difference.”

  “I cannot, Lord Agelmar.” Moiraine seemed troubled. “There is indeed a battle to be fought, and it is not chance that the Trollocs gather above Shienar, but our battle, the true battle with the Dark One, will take place in the Blight, at the Eye of the World. You must fight your battle, and we ours.”

  “You cannot be saying he is loose!” Rocklike Agelmar sounded shaken, and Moiraine quickly shook her head.