The Wheel of Time

by Robert Jordan

  Hacking and panting, Mat leaned on his dark-shafted spear.

  “Did you do that?” he wheezed, wiping blood away from his eyes. “About time. If you knew how, why didn’t you bloody do it in the first place?”

  Rand started to laugh again—Because I didn’t think of it. Because I didn’t know how until I did it—but it froze in his mouth. Dust drifted out of the air, and as it settled on the ground, it began to ripple. “Run,” he said. “We have to get out of here. Run!”

  Side by side they sped for the fog, slashing at any lines of dust that seemed to be thickening, kicking at them, anything to keep them from coalescing. Rand sent whirlwinds swirling wildly in every direction. Dispelled dust began shivering back together immediately, even before it reached the ground now. They kept running, into the fog and through, bursting out into dim, sharp-shadowed light.

  Side aching, Rand spun, ready to try lightning, or fire, anything. Nothing came through the fog after them. Maybe the mist was a wall to those dark shapes. Maybe it held them in. Maybe . . . . He did not know. He did not really care, so long as the things could not follow.

  “Burn me,” Mat muttered hoarsely, “we were in there all night. It’s nearly sunrise. I didn’t think it was that long.”

  Rand stared at the sky. The sun had not topped the mountains yet; a painfully brilliant nimbus outlined the jagged peaks. Long shadows covered the valley floor. He will come from Rhuidean at dawn, and tie you together with bonds you cannot break. He will take you back, and he will destroy you.

  “Let’s go back up the mountain,” he said quietly. “They will be waiting for us.” For me.

  CHAPTER 27

  Within the Ways

  The darkness of the Ways compressed the light of Perrin’s pole-lantern to a sharp-edged pool around himself and Gaul. The creak of his saddle, the gritty click of hooves on stone, seemed to reach no further than light’s rim. There was no smell to the air; nothing. The Aielman strode along beside Stepper easily, keeping an eye on the dimly seen lanternglow from Loial’s party ahead. Perrin refused to call it Faile’s. The Ways did not seem to bother Gaul, for all their reputation. Perrin himself could not help listening, as he had for nearly two days, or what passed for days in this lightless place. His ears would be first to catch the sound that meant they were all going to die or worse, the sound of wind rising where no wind ever blew. No wind but Machin Shin, the Black Wind that ate souls. He could not help thinking that traveling the Ways was slack-witted folly, but when need called, what was foolish changed.

  The faint light ahead stopped, and he drew rein in the middle of what appeared to be an ancient stone bridge arching through utter blackness, ancient because of the breaks in the bridge walls, the pits and shallow ragged craters freckling the roadbed. Very likely it had stood close to three thousand years, but it seemed ready to fall, now. Maybe right now.

  The packhorse crowded up behind Stepper: the animals whickered to each other and rolled their eyes uneasily at the surrounding dark. Perrin knew how the horses felt. A few more people for company would have lifted some of the endless night’s weight. Still, he would not have gone any closer to the lanterns ahead even had he been alone. Not and risk a repeat of what happened back on that first Island, right after entering the Waygate in Tear. He scratched his curly beard irritably. He was not sure what he had expected, but not . . . .

  The pole-lantern bobbed as he stepped down from his saddle and led Stepper and the packhorse to the Guiding, a tall slab of white stone covered with cursive silver inlays vaguely reminiscent of vines and leaves, all pitted as if splashed with acid. He could not read it, of course—Loial had to do that; it was Ogier script—and after a moment he walked around it, studying the Island. It was the same as the others he had seen, with a chest-high wall of white stone, simple curves and rounds fitted in an intricate pattern. At intervals bridges pierced the wall, arching out into the darkness, and railless ramps running up or down with no means of support he could see. There were cracks everywhere, ragged pits and shallow craters, as though the stone were rotting. When the horses moved there was a grainy sound of stone flaking away beneath their hooves. Gaul peered into the dark with no visible nervousness, but then, he did not know what might be out there. Perrin did, too well.

  When Loial and the others arrived, Faile immediately hopped from her black mare and strode straight to Perrin, eyes intent on his face. He was already regretting making her worry, but she did not look worried at all. He could not have said what her expression was, besides fixed.

  “Have you decided to talk to me instead of over my hea—?”

  Her full-armed slap made spots dance in front of his eyes. “What did you mean,” she practically spat, “charging in here like a wild boar? You have no regard. None!”

  He took a slow, deep breath. “I asked you before not to do that.” Her dark, tilted eyes widened as if he had said something infuriating. He was rubbing his cheek when her second slap caught him on the other side, nearly unhinging his jaw. The Aiel were watching interestedly, and Loial with his ears drooping.

  “I told you not to do that,” he growled. Her fist was not very big, but her sudden punch to his shortribs drove most of the air from his lungs, hunching him over sideways, and she drew back her fist again. With a snarl, he seized her by the scruff of her neck and . . . .

  Well, it was her own fault. It was. He had asked her not to hit him, told her. Her own fault. He was surprised she had not tried to pull one of her knives, though; she seemed to carry as many as Mat.

  She had been furious, of course. Furious with Loial for trying to intervene; she could take care of herself, thank you very much. Furious with Bain and Chiad for not intervening; she had been taken aback when they said they did not think she would want them to interfere in a fight she had picked. When you choose the fight, Bain had said, you must take the consequences, win or lose. But she did not seem even the tiniest bit angry with him any longer. That made him nervous. She had only stared at him, her dark eyes glistening with unshed tears, which made him feel guilty, which in turn made him angry. Why should he be guilty? Was he supposed to stand there and let her hit him to her heart’s content? She had mounted Swallow and sat there, very stiff-backed, refusing to sit gingerly, staring at him with an unreadable expression. It made him very nervous. He almost wished she had pulled a knife. Almost.

  “They are moving again,” Gaul said.

  Perrin jerked back to the present. The other light was moving. Now it paused. One of them had noticed his light was not following yet. Probably Loial. Faile might not mind if he got lost, and the two Aiel women had twice tried to talk him into walking off a little way with them. He had not needed the slight shake of Gaul’s head to refuse. He heeled Stepper forward, leading the packhorse.

  The Guiding here was more pocked than most he had seen, but he rode on past it with only a glance. The light of the other lanterns was already starting down one of the gently sloping ramps, and he followed with a sigh. He hated the ramps. Sided only by darkness, it began to curve, down and around, with nothing discernible beyond the squashed light of the lantern swaying above his head. Something told him that a fall over the edge would never end. Stepper and the packhorse kept to the middle without any urging, and even Gaul avoided the brink. Worse, when the ramp ended on another Island, there was no way to escape the conclusion that it lay directly beneath the one they had just left. He was glad to see Gaul glancing upward, glad he was not alone in wondering what held the Islands up and whether it was still sound.

  Once more Loial and Faile’s lanterns had stopped by the Guiding, so he reined up again, just off the ramp. This time they did not move on, though. After a few moments, Faile’s voice called, “Perrin.”

  He exchanged looks with Gaul, and the Aiel shrugged. She had not spoken to Perrin since he . . . .

  “Perrin, come here.” Not peremptory, exactly, but not asking, either.

  Bain and Chiad were squatting easily beside the Guiding, and Loial and Fail
e sat their horses close by, pole-lanterns in hand. The Ogier had their packhorses’ lead line; his ear tufts twitched as he looked from Faile to Perrin and back again. She, on the other hand, seemed completely absorbed in adjusting her riding gloves, of soft green leather with golden falcons embroidered on their backs. She had changed her dress, too. The new one was cut in the same fashion, with a high neck and narrow divided skirts, but it was a dark green brocaded silk, and somehow it seemed to emphasize her bosom. Perrin had never seen the dress before.

  “What do you want?” he asked warily.

  She looked up as if surprised to see him, tilted her head thoughtfully, then smiled as though it had just occurred to her. “Oh, yes. I wanted to see if you could be taught to come when I call.” Her smiled deepened; it had to be because she had heard his teeth grinding. He scrubbed at his nose; there was a faint rank smell here.

  Gaul chuckled softly. “As well try to understand the sun, Perrin. It simply is, and it is not to be understood. You cannot live without it, but it exacts a price. So with women.”

  Bain leaned over to whisper in Chiad’s ear, and they both laughed. From the way they looked at Gaul and him, Perrin did not think he would like hearing what the women found so funny.

  “It is not that at all,” Loial rumbled, ears shifting testily. He gave Faile an accusing look, which did not abash her at all; she smiled at him vaguely and went back to her gloves, snugging each finger all over again. “I am sorry, Perrin. She insisted on being the one to call you. This is why. We are there.” He pointed to the base of the Guiding, where a wide pit-broken white line ran off, not to bridge or ramp, but into the darkness. “The Waygate at Manetheren, Perrin.”

  Perrin nodded, saying nothing. He was not about to suggest they follow the line, not and have Faile call him down for trying to take over. He rubbed his nose again absently; that almost imperceptible scent of rankness was irritating. He was not going to make even the most sensible suggestion. If she wanted to lead, let her. But she sat her saddle, fooling with her gloves, obviously waiting for him to speak so she could make some witty remark. She liked wittiness; he preferred saying what he meant. Irritably, he turned Stepper, meaning to go on without her or Loial. The line led to the Waygate, and he could pick out the Avendesora leaf that opened it himself.

  Suddenly his ear caught a muffled click of hooves from the darkness, and the fetid smell slammed home in his mind. “Trollocs!” he shouted.

  Gaul pivoted smoothly to slide a spear into the black-mailed chest of a wolf-snouted Trolloc dashing into the light with scythelike sword upraised; in the same effortless motion the Aiel pulled his spearpoint free and sidestepped to let the huge shape fall. More came behind it, though, all goatsnouts and boar’s tusks, cruel beaks and twisted horns, with curved swords and spiked axes and hooked spears. The horses danced and screamed.

  Holding his pole-lantern high—the thought of facing these things in the dark gave him cold sweat—Perrin clawed for a weapon, swung at a face distorted by a sharp-toothed snout. He was surprised to realize he had pulled the hammer free of its lashings on his saddlebags, but if it did not have the axe’s sharp edge, ten pounds of steel wielded by a blacksmith’s arm still sent the Trolloc staggering back shrieking and clutching a ruined face.

  Loial dashed his pole-lantern against a goat-horned head, and the lantern broke; bathed in burning oil, the Trolloc ran howling into the dark. The Ogier flailed about him with the stout pole, a switch in his huge hands, but one that landed with sharp cracks of splintering bone. One of Faile’s knives blossomed in an all-too-human eye above a tusked snout. The Aiel danced the spears, having somehow found time to veil themselves. Perrin struck, and struck, and struck. A whirlwind of death that lasted . . . . A minute? Five? It seemed an hour. But suddenly the Trollocs were down, those not already dead kicking in their death throes.

  Perrin sucked air into his lungs; his right arm felt as if the weight of the hammer might pull it off. There was a burning sensation on his face, a wetness trickling down his side, another on his leg, where Trolloc steel had gotten through. Each of the Aiel had at least one damp patch darkening their brown-and-gray clothes, and Loial wore a bloody gash down his thigh. Perrin’s eyes went right past them, seeking Faile. If she was hurt . . . . She sat atop her black mare, a knife in her hand ready to throw. She had actually managed to pull off her gloves and tuck them neatly behind her belt. He could not see a wound on her. In all the blood smell—human, Ogier, Trolloc—he could not have picked out hers if she were bleeding, but he knew her scent, and she did not have the pained smell of injury. Bright lights hurt Trolloc eyes; they did not adapt quickly. Very likely the only reason they were still alive and the Trollocs dead was that abrupt entry from darkness into light.

  That was all the time they had, a moment’s respite, long enough to glance around, take breath. With a roar like a hundred pounds of bone falling into a huge meat grinder, a Fade leaped into the light, eyeless stare a stare of death, black sword flickering like lightning. The horses screamed, trying to bolt.

  Gaul barely managed to turn that blade with his buckler, losing a slice from the side of it as if the layers of cured bullhide were only paper. He stabbed, eluded a thrust—barely—and stabbed again. Arrows sprouted in the Myrddraal’s chest. Bain and Chiad had thrust their spears through the harness holding the cased bows on their backs and were using those curved horn bows. More arrows, pincushioning the Halfman’s chest. Gaul’s spear, darting, stabbing. One of Faile’s knives suddenly stood out in that smooth maggot-white face. The Fade would not fall, would not stop trying to kill. Only the wildest dodging kept its sword from finding flesh.

  Perrin bared his teeth in an unconscious snarl. He hated Trollocs as an enemy of his blood, but the Neverborn . . . ? It was worth dying to kill a Neverborn. To put my teeth in its throat . . . ! Careless of whether he blocked Bain and Chiad’s arrows, he guided Stepper closer to the Neverborn’s back, forcing the reluctant dun nearer with reins and knees. At the last instant, the creature spun away from Gaul, seemingly ignoring a spearpoint that thrust between its shoulders and came out below its throat, staring up at Perrin with the eyeless gaze that sent fear into every man’s soul. Too late. Perrin’s hammer fell, shattering head and eyeless gaze alike.

  Even down and virtually headless, the Myrddraal still thrashed, lashing aimlessly with its Thakan’dar-wrought blade. Stepper danced back, whickering nervously, and suddenly Perrin felt as if he had been doused in icy water. That black steel made wounds even Aes Sedai found hard to Heal, and he had ridden in uncaring. My teeth in its . . . . Light, I have to keep hold of myself. I have to!

  He could still hear smothered sounds from the darkness at the far end of the Island, the clatter of hoofed feet, the scrape of boots, harsh breathing and guttural murmurs. More Trollocs; how many he could not say. A pity they had not been linked to the Myrddraal, yet perhaps they might hesitate to attack without it to drive them. Trollocs were usually cowards in their way, preferring strong odds and easy kills. But even lacking a Myrddraal they could work themselves up to come again eventually.

  “The Waygate,” he said. “We have to get out before they decide what to do without that.” He used the bloody hammer to gesture to the still flailing Fade. Faile reined Swallow around immediately, and he was so surprised, he blurted, “You aren’t going to argue?”

  “Not when you speak sense,” she said briskly. “Not when you speak sense. Loial?”

  The Ogier took the lead on his tall, hairy-fetlocked mount. Perrin backed Stepper after Faile and Loial, hammer in hand, the Aiel siding him, all with bows ready now. Shuffling hooves and boots followed in the blackness, and harsh mutters in a language too rough for human tongues. Back and back, with the mutters edging closer, working up courage.

  Another sound floated to Perrin, like silk sighing across silk. It sent shivers along his bones. Louder, a distant giant’s exhalation, rising, falling, rising higher. “Hurry!” he shouted. “Hurry!”

  “I am,” Loial ba
rked. “I—That sound! Is it—? The Light illumine our souls, and the Creator’s hand shelter us! It’s opening. It is opening! I must be last. Out! Out! But not too—No, Faile!”

  Perrin risked a glance over his shoulder. Twin gates of apparently living leaves were swinging open, revealing a smoked-glass view of mountainous country. Loial had dismounted to remove the Avendesora leaf to unlock the gate, and Faile had their pack animals’ leads and his huge mount’s reins. With a hasty shout of “Follow me! Quickly!” she booted Swallow’s ribs, and the Tairen mare sprang toward the opening.

  “After her,” Perrin told the Aiel. “Hurry! You cannot fight this.” Wisely they hesitated only a heartbeat before peeling back, Gaul seizing the packhorse’s lead line. Stepper came abreast of Loial. “Can you lock it shut some way? Block it?” A frantic edge had entered the harsh mutterings; the Trollocs had recognized the sound too, now. Machin Shin was coming. Living meant getting out of the Ways.

  “Yes,” Loial said. “Yes. But go. Go!”

  Perrin reined Stepper back quickly toward the Gate, yet before he knew what he was doing he had thrown back his head and howled, defiance and challenge. Foolish, foolish, foolish! Still, he kept his eyes on that pitch dark and backed Stepper into the Waygate. An icy ripple slid across him hair by hair, and time stretched out. The jolt of leaving the Ways hit him, as if he had gone from a dead gallop to a stop in one step.

  The Aiel were still turning to face the Waygate, spreading out across the slope with arrows nocked, among low bushes and stunted mountain trees, wind-twisted pine and fir and leatherleaf. Faile was just picking herself up from where she had tumbled from Swallow’s saddle, the black mare nuzzling her. Galloping out of a Waygate was at least as bad as galloping in; she was lucky she had not broken her neck, and her horse’s, too. Loial’s tall horse and her packhorses were trembling as though hit between the eyes. Perrin opened his mouth, and she glared at him, daring him to make any comment at all, maybe a sympathetic one least of all. He grimaced wryly and wisely kept silent.