Vandene directed a sharp sniff at Nynaeve, but allowed herself to be led outside.
Waiting a moment to let them leave, Nynaeve saw Sheriam come out of one of the meeting rooms with Myrelle, Morvrin and Beonin. Myrelle saw her, too, and started in her direction, but only a step before Sheriam and Morvrin each put a hand on the Green sister’s arms and spoke quickly and softly, with many a glance at Nynaeve. Still talking, the four crossed the room and disappeared through another door.
Nynaeve waited until she was back in front of the Little Tower before giving her braid a firm, deliberate tug. They had met the Wise Ones last night. Guessing why the others had stopped Myrelle from speaking was easy enough. If Egwene had finally been there in the Heart of the Stone, she was not to be told. Nynaeve al’Meara was in disgrace. Nynaeve al’Meara was scrubbing pots like a novice when she might have been at least a step higher than Accepted. Nynaeve al’Meara was getting nowhere with Theodrin, and all her marvelous discoveries had dried up. Nynaeve al’Meara would never be Aes Sedai. She had known it was a mistake to start funneling everything from Moghedien through Elayne. She had known it!
Her tongue tried to curl up at the memory of a vile taste. Boiled catfern and powdered mavinsleaf. An antidote she had used on many a child who would not stop lying. All right; she had been the one to suggest it herself, but it was still a mistake. Aes Sedai were no longer talking about her innovations; they talked about the lack of them. Aes Sedai who had never taken more than a passing interest in her block were now caught up in how to break it down. She could not win. One way or another she was going to end up with Aes Sedai examining her from hair to toenails, sunup to sundown.
She yanked harder on her braid, hard enough to hurt her scalp, and the way her head felt, that did nothing for her temper. A soldier in an archer’s flat helmet and padded jerkin slowed to look at her curiously, but she gave him such a stare of refined malevolence that he stumbled over his own feet and quickly lost himself in the throng. Why did Elayne have to be so stubborn?
A man’s hands closed on her shoulders, and she whirled about with words that would rip his head from his neck. They died on her tongue.
Thom Merrilin grinned down at her through his long white mustaches, sharp blue eyes twinkling in his gnarled face. “By the look of you, Nynaeve, I could almost think you were angry, but I know you have such a sweet disposition people ask you to dabble your fingers in their tea.”
Juilin Sandar was there beside him, the lean fellow looking carved from dark wood, leaning on his thumb-thick bamboo staff. Juilin was Tairen, not Taraboner, but he still wore that ridiculous flat-topped conical red cap, even more battered than she had last seen it. He snatched it off when she glanced at him. Both men were dusty and travel-worn, their faces gaunt, though neither had been particularly fleshy to begin with. They looked as if they had spent the weeks since leaving Salidar sleeping in their clothes when they were not in the saddle.
Before Nynaeve could open her mouth, they were hit by a human storm. Elayne flung herself at Thom so hard he staggered. He of course put his hands under her arms and hoisted her, whirling her around in a circle like a child despite his slight limp. He was laughing when he set her down again, and so was she. She reached up and tugged at one of his mustaches, and they fell to laughing even harder. He examined her hands, as wrinkled as Nynaeve’s, asking what sort of trouble she had dived into without him to keep her on the straight and narrow, and she replied that she had no need of anyone to tell her what to do, only she spoiled it by blushing, and giggling, and biting her lip.
Nynaeve took a deep breath. Sometimes the pair of them took playing at father and daughter entirely too far. Sometimes Elayne seemed to think she was about ten, and so did Thom. “I thought you had a novice class this morning, Elayne.”
The other woman glanced at her sideways, then gathered herself in an attempt at decorum that came too late, and set about straightening her banded dress. “I asked Calindin to take it,” she said casually. “I thought I might keep you company. And I’m glad I did,” she added with a grin for Thom. “Now we can hear everything you learned in Amadicia.”
Nynaeve sniffed. Keep her company indeed. She did not remember everything about yesterday, but she remembered Elayne laughing while getting her undressed and putting her to bed with the sun not yet all the way down. And she was sure she remembered the woman asking whether she wanted a bucket of water to cool her head.
Thom noticed nothing; most men were blind, though he was sharp enough usually. “We will have to be quick,” he said. “Now Sheriam’s drained us dry, she means to have us report to some of the Sitters in person. Luckily, it boils down well enough. There aren’t enough Whitecloaks along the Eldar to keep a mouse from crossing, if he had drums and trumpets to announce him a day ahead. Except for a strong force on the Tarabon border and the men he has trying to hold back the Prophet in the north, Niall seems to be gathering every last Whitecloak around Amadicia, and Ailron is pulling in his soldiers, too. Talk of Salidar had started in the streets before we left, but if Niall has even thought about the place twice, I could find not a hint of it anywhere.”
“Tarabon,” Juilin muttered, studying his cap. “All ill country for anyone who doesn’t know how to take care of herself, or so we heard.”
Nynaeve was not sure which of the two was best at dissembling, but she was sure either could lie to your face to make a wool merchant blue with envy. And right then, she was sure they were hiding something.
Elayne saw more than that. Gripping Thom’s lapel, she peered up at him. “You heard something about Mother,” she said calmly, and it was not a question.
Thom knuckled his mustaches. “There are a hundred rumors on every street in Amadicia, child, each wilder than the last.” His gnarled leathery face was pure innocence and openness, but the man had not been innocent the day he was born. “It’s said the whole White Tower is here in Salidar, with ten thousand Warders ready to cross the Eldar. It’s said Aes Sedai have captured Tanchico, and Rand has wings he uses to fly around in the night, and—”
“Thom?” Elayne said.
He snorted, glaring at Juilin and Nynaeve as though this were their fault. “Child, it’s just a rumor, as crazed as any we heard. I could not confirm anything, and believe me, I tried. I meant not to mention it. It just stirs up your pain. Let it pass, child.”
“Thom.” Much firmer. Shifting his feet, Juilin looked as if he wished he were somewhere else. Thom just looked grim.
“Well, if you must hear it. Everybody in Amadicia seems to think your mother is in the Fortress of the Light, that she’s going to lead an army of Whitecloaks back to Andor.”
Elayne shook her head, laughing softly. “Oh, Thom, do you think I would worry over something like that? Mother would never go to the Whitecloaks. I could wish she had. I could wish she was alive to. Even though it violates everything she ever taught me—bringing foreign soldiers into Andor; and Whitecloaks!—I could wish it. But if wishes were wings . . .” Her smile was sad, but it was a muted sadness. “I have done my grieving, Thom. Mother is dead, and I must do my best to be worthy of her. She would never have gone running after ridiculous rumors, or wept over them either.”
“Child,” he said awkwardly.
Nynaeve wondered what if anything he himself felt about Morgase’s death. Hard as it was to believe, he had been Morgase’s lover once, when she was young and Elayne little more than a babe. Back then he must not have looked as though he had been left to dry in the sun too long. Nynaeve knew little more of how or why it ended than that he had slipped out of Caemlyn with an arrest warrant at his heels. Not the mark of a love to be told in the stories. At the moment he certainly appeared concerned only with whether Elayne was telling the truth or hiding her hurt, with patting her shoulder and stroking her hair. If Nynaeve had not wished they would just once snap at one another like normal people, she would have thought it a pretty picture.
A throat clearing broke up the vignette. “Master Merrilin
?” Tabitha said, spreading her white dress in a quick curtsy. “Master Sandar? Sheriam Sedai says the Sitters are ready to receive you. She says you were not supposed to leave the Little Tower.”
“The Little Tower, is it?” Thom said dryly, eyeing the former inn. “Elayne, they can’t keep us forever. When we’re done, you and I can discuss . . . whatever you wish.” Motioning Tabiya to lead, he marched inside, his limp obvious, the way it was when he was tired. Juilin squared his shoulders and followed as though walking to a gallows; he was Tairen, after all.
Nynaeve and Elayne stood there, neither quite looking at the other.
Finally, Nynaeve said, “I was not—” at the same time that Elayne said, “I should not—” They cut off together, and moments passed in fidgeting with skirts and blotting faces.
“It is too hot to just stand here,” Nynaeve said at last.
It was unlikely that the Sitters who were hearing Siuan and Leane’s reports would stop to hear Thom and Juilin’s. They split such things among them. That left Logain, much as she wished it did not. She would not learn anything. But it was better than twiddling her thumbs until a dozen Aes Sedai descended on her with an hourly schedule.
With a sigh she started down the street. Elayne came along as though she had been invited. That helped Nynaeve find the anger she was going to need. Abruptly she realized that Elayne’s wrists were bare.
“Where is the bracelet?” she asked softly. No one in the street would understand if they heard, but caution once forgotten could be forgotten once too often. “Where is Marigan?”
“The bracelet is in my pouch, Nynaeve.” Elayne stepped aside to let a high-wheeled cart pass, then joined Nynaeve again behind the cart. “Marigan is doing our laundry, with about twenty other women around her. And groaning every time she moves. She said something she didn’t think Birgitte would hear, and Birgitte. . . . I had to take the thing off, Nynaeve. Birgitte had the right, and it hurt. I told Marigan to say she fell down some stairs.”
Nynaeve sniffed, but her heart was not in it. She had not been wearing the bracelet much of late. Not because she could not hand over anything she dug out as her own. She was still sure Moghedien knew something about Healing even if she did not realize it herself—nobody could be that blind—and there was the trick of detecting a man’s channeling that Moghedien kept saying they almost had right. The truth of it was, she was afraid she might do far worse than Birgitte had if she had any more contact with the woman than was absolutely necessary. Maybe it was the way satisfaction seemed to underlie everything else even when Moghedien was groaning from the fed-back pain of Nynaeve trying to master that detection. Maybe it was remembering how afraid she had been, alone with the woman without the bracelet. Maybe growing disgust at keeping one of the Forsaken from judgment. Maybe some of all of it. What she did know was that she had to make herself put on the bracelet now, and that whenever she saw Moghedien’s face, she wanted to pound it with her fists.
“I should not have laughed,” Elayne said. “I am sorry I did.”
Nynaeve stopped dead so suddenly that a horseman had to jerk his reins to keep from riding over her. He shouted something before the crowd carried him away, but shock muffled his words beyond hearing. Not shock at the apology. At what she had to say. The right thing to say. The truth.
Unable to look at Elayne, she started walking again. “You had every right to laugh. I. . . .” She swallowed hard. “I made a complete fool of myself.” She had. A few sips, Theodrin said; a cup. And she emptied the pitcher. If you were going to fail, better to have some other reason than that you just could not do it. “You should have sent for that bucket and dunked my head until I could recite The Great Hunt of the Horn without a mistake.” She risked a glance from the corner of her eye. Small spots of color rested in Elayne’s cheeks. So there had been mention of a bucket.
“It could happen to anyone,” the other woman said simply.
Nynaeve felt her own cheeks heating. When it had happened to Elayne, she had dunked the girl to wash away the wine. “You should have done whatever you needed to . . . to sober me.”
It was quite the oddest argument Nynaeve could remember, with her insisting she had been a total fool and deserved whatever came of it, while Elayne made excuse after excuse for her. Nynaeve did not understand why it felt so refreshing, taking all the blame on herself that way. She could not recall ever doing that before, not without hedging as far as she was able. She very nearly got angry with Elayne for not agreeing that she had been a childish buffoon. It lasted until they reached the small thatched house on the edge of the village where Logain was kept.
“If you don’t stop this,” Elayne said finally, “I vow I’ll send for a bucket of water right this instant.”
Nynaeve opened her mouth, then closed it again. Even in this newfound euphoria of admitting she had been wrong, that was going too far. Feeling this good, she could not face Logain. Feeling this good, it would be useless anyway, without Moghedien and the bracelet she definitely felt too fine to put on. She glanced at the two Warders standing guard beside the stone-linteled door. They were not close enough to hear, but she still pitched her voice low. “Elayne, let’s go. Tonight.” With Thom and Juilin in Salidar, there was no need to ask Uno to find horses. “Not to Caemlyn, if you don’t want. To Ebou Dar. Merilille will never find that bowl, and Sheriam will never let us go find it. What do you say? Tonight?”
“No, Nynaeve. What good can we do Rand if they take us for runaways? Which is what we’d be. You promised, Nynaeve. You promised, if we found something.”
“I promised if we found something we could use. All we’ve found is this!” Nynaeve thrust her shriveled hands under the other woman’s nose.
The firmness slid from Elayne’s face, and her voice; she pursed her lips and studied the ground. “Nynaeve, you know I told Birgitte we were staying. Well, it seems she told Uno that under no circumstances was he to provide you with a horse unless she said so. She told him you were thinking of running away. I didn’t find out until it was too late.” Her head tossed irritably. “If this is what having a Warder is like, I don’t know why anybody wants one.”
Nynaeve thought her eyes might burst from indignation. So that was why he had been staring at her. Euphoria vanished in a heat of—well, partly anger, partly humiliation. The man knew; he thought she. . . . Wait. For a moment she frowned at Elayne, then decided not to voice the question that had come to mind. Was Nynaeve the only name Birgitte had mentioned to Uno, or was Elayne perhaps included? Elayne had found herself quite an adopted family. In Thom, an indulgent father who wanted to teach her everything he knew, and in Birgitte, an older sister who thought it was her job to keep the younger from breaking her neck riding horses she could not handle yet.
“In that case,” she said flatly, “let’s see what I can learn from Logain.”
It was a small house, only two rooms, but thick stone walls made it relatively cool. Logain was in his shirtsleeves, smoking a pipe and reading by a window. The Aes Sedai were taking good care of him. The chairs and tables were as fine as anything in Salidar—nothing elaborate, but well made, though nothing matched anything else—and a scroll-woven red-and-gold carpet covered much of a floor that was swept so clean Nynaeve doubted he did the sweeping.
He set his book down when they entered, seemingly not at all put out by the lack of a knock. Rising leisurely, he tapped out his pipe, donned his coat and only then made a smooth leg. “It is good to see you again after so long. I thought you had forgotten me. Will you join me in some wine? The Aes Sedai keep me on short supply, but what they do let me have is not bad at all.”
The offer of wine would have been enough—Nynaeve barely suppressed a wince—if she had needed more. Thinking of Uno, the fact that he was male was enough. No need to pull up any of her anger from the Little Tower. Thinking of it added its bit, though. The True Source was suddenly there, an unseen warmth just out of sight. She opened herself, and saidar flooded her; if what she had felt ea
rlier was euphoria, this was beyond ecstasy. She was surrendering to it, burn Theodrin!
“Sit down,” she told him coldly. “I’ll have no chatter out of you. Answer when you’re spoken to, and otherwise hold your tongue.”
Logain only shrugged and complied, meek as a puppy. No, not meek; that smile was pure insolence. Part came from his feelings toward Aes Sedai, Nynaeve was certain, and part. . . . He watched Elayne take another chair, arranging her skirts with a studied care, and even if Nynaeve had not seen what he was looking at, she would have known it was a woman. There was no smirking about it, no leering, just. . . . Nynaeve did not know what, only that he directed the same at her, and she was suddenly very much aware that she was a woman and he a man. Maybe it was just that he was handsome and had broad shoulders, but she liked to think better of herself. Of course that was not it.
Clearing her throat, she wove filaments of saidar into him, Air and Water, Fire and Earth, Spirit. All the elements of Healing, but used now to probe. It would have helped to lay her hands on him, but she could not bring herself to do that. Bad enough to touch him with the Power. He was healthy as a bull and almost as strong, nothing wrong with him in the slightest—except for the hole.
It was not really a hole, more a feeling that what seemed continuous was not, that what seemed smooth and straight was really skirting around an absence. She knew that sensation well, from the early days, back when she thought she might really learn something. It still made her skin crawl.
He looked up at her intently. She did not remember moving closer. His face was fixed in a mask of brazen contempt; she might not be Aes Sedai, but she was the next thing to it.
“How can you do all of that at once?” Elayne asked. “I could not keep track of half of it.”
“Hush,” Nynaeve murmured. Hiding the effort required, she took Logain’s head in her hands roughly. Yes. It was better with physical contact, the impressions sharper.
She directed the full flow of saidar into where the hole should have been—and was almost surprised to find an emptiness. Of course, she still did not expect to learn anything. Men were as different from women in the Power as they were in flesh, maybe more so. She might as well study a rock to find out about fish. It was hard to keep her thoughts on what she was doing, knowing she was only going through motions, killing time as it were.
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