Mistress Cinchonine appeared at once, as round as any innkeeper Merana had ever seen, bobbing bows and dry-washing her pink hands. “Is there anything I can do for you, Aes Sedai? Anything I can fetch?” She had accommodated Merana often, and well, both before and after learning she was Aes Sedai.

“Berry tea,” Merana told her, smiling. “In the private sitting room upstairs.” The smile went as the innkeeper scurried away calling for one of the serving women. Merana motioned sharply for Alanna and Verin to join her on the stairs, and the five of them climbed in silence.

The sitting-room windows gave a good view of the street for those who wished it, which Merana did not particularly. She pulled in the windows that were open, to shut out some of the noise, and turned her back on them. Seonid and Masuri had taken chairs. Alanna and Verin remained standing, between the other two. Verin’s dark wool dress had an air of being rumpled, though it was not, and she had an ink-stain on the tip of her nose, but her eyes were birdlike, sharp and watchful. Alanna’s eyes shone too, but very likely with anger, and now and then her hands quivered slightly, gripping the skirts of her yellow-bodiced blue silk dress; it looked as if she had slept in it. There was some excuse for her; of course. Some, but not enough.

“I do not know yet, Alanna,” Merana said firmly, “whether your actions have had any adverse effect. He did not bring up your bonding him — against his will — but he was sharp, very sharp, and — ”

“Has he set further restrictions?” Verin broke in, tilting her head slightly. “All seems to be going well, to me. He did not fly away at news of you. He has received three; in some courtesy, at least, or you would be at thunderheads. He is a little frightened of us, which is to the good, or he would not have set limits, but unless he has set more, we still have as much freedom as before, so he is not terrified. Above all, we must not frighten him too far.”

The difficulty was that Verin and Alanna were not part of Merana’s delegation; she had no authority over them. They had heard the news of Logain and the Reds and agreed that Elaida could not be allowed to remain in the Amyrlin Seat, yet that meant nothing. Of course, Alanna was not really a problem, only potentially. She and Merana were so close in strength that the only way to say which had the greater would be an actual contest, the sort of thing novices did until they were caught. Alanna had been six years a novice, Merana only five, but more importantly, Merana had been Aes Sedai ten years the day the midwife laid Alanna at her mother’s breast. That took care of that. Merana had precedence. No one actually thought in those terms unless something made them, but they both knew and adjusted automatically. Not that Alanna would take orders, yet instinctive deference would surely keep her in hand to some degree. That, and knowing what she had done.

Verin was the problem, the one who had Merana thinking of strengths and precedence. Merana let herself sense the other woman’s strength in the Power again, though of course she knew what she would find. No way to tell which of them was stronger. Five years as novice for each, six as Accepted; that was one thing every Aes Sedai knew about every other if she knew nothing else. The difference was that Verin was older, maybe almost as much older than she as she was older than Alanna. The touch of gray in Verin’s hair emphasized it. Had Verin been part of the embassy, there would have been no difficulty at all, but she was not, and Merana found herself listening attentively, deferring without thinking. Twice in the morning she had had to remind herself that Verin was not in charge. The only thing that made the situation tolerable was that Verin must feel she shared some of Alanna’s guilt. Without that she surely would have been in a chair as soon as anyone else, not standing beside Alanna. If only there were some way to make her remain at Culain’s Hound day and night to watch over that wonderful treasure of girls from the Two Rivers.

Seating herself so she, Seonid and Masuri surrounded the pair, Merana adjusted her skirts and shawl carefully. There was some moral ascendancy in being seated while the others remained standing. To her, what Alanna had done was little short of rape. “In fact, he has placed another restriction. It is all very well that you two have located his school, but now I strongly suggest you abandon whatever thoughts you may have had in that direction. He has . . . charged us . . . to stay away from his . . . men.” She could see him still, leaning forward in that monstrosity of a throne with the Lion Throne on exhibit behind him and a carved piece of spear in his fist; no doubt an Aiel custom, that.

“Hear me, Merana Sedai,” he said, quite pleasantly and quite firmly. “I want no trouble between Aes Sedai and Asha’man. I have told the soldiers to stay clear of you, but I do not mean them to be Aes Sedai meat. If you go hunting at the Black Tower, you may be dinner yourself. We both want to avoid that.”

Merana had been Aes Sedai long enough not to shiver every time a goose walked over her grave, but it was close this time. Asha’man. The Black Tower. Mazrim Taim! How could it have gone so far? Yet Alanna was certain there were over a hundred men, though she gave no details of how she knew, of course; no sister willingly exposed her eyes-and-ears. It did not matter. “If you pursue two hares, both will escape you,” the old saying went, and al’Thor was the most important hare in the world. The others had to wait.

“Is he . . .? Is he still here, or has he gone?” Verin and Alanna seemed to take it very calmly that al’Thor apparently could Travel; it still made Merana a trifle queasy. What else had he taught himself that Aes Sedai had forgotten? “Alanna? Alanna!”

The slender Green sister jerked, pulling herself back from wherever her mind had been. She seemed to drift quite often. “He is in the city. In the Palace, I think.” She still sounded a little dreamy. “It was . . . He has a wound in his side. An old wound, yet only half-healed. Every time I let myself dwell on it, I want to weep. How can he live with it?”

Seonid gave her a sharp look; any woman who had a Warder had felt his injuries. But she knew what Alanna was going through, having lost Owein, and when she spoke, her voice was almost gentle and only a little brisk. “Why, Teryl and Furen have taken wounds that almost made me faint, even feeling them as softly as we do, and they never slowed a step. Not one step.”

“I think,” Masuri said quietly, “we are going afield.” She always spoke quietly, but unlike many Browns, always to the point.

Merana nodded. “Yes. I considered taking Moiraine’s place with him . . . ”

A rap at the door announced a white-aproned woman with the tea tray. A silver teapot and porcelain cups; The Crown and Rose was used to the nobility. By the time the tray was settled and the serving woman gone, Alanna was no longer dreamy. Her dark eyes flashed with all the fire Merana had ever seen in them. Greens particularly were jealous of their Warders and al’Thor belonged to her now, however she had bonded him. Deference went down the well when it came to that. Straight as a blade she stood, just waiting for Merana’s next words to see whether to slash and cut. Still, Merana waited until the blueberry tea was poured and everyone back in her chair. She even told Verin and Alanna to sit. The fool woman deserved a little upset, even atop Owein. Maybe it was not short of rape at all.

“I considered it,” she went on at last, “and rejected it. I might have done so if you had not done what you did, Alanna, but he is so suspicious of Aes Sedai now that he might well laugh in my face if I suggested it.”

“He is as arrogant as any king,” Seonid said curtly.

“Everything Elayne and Nynaeve said and more,” Masuri added, shaking her head. “Claiming that he knows when a woman channels. I almost embraced saidar to show him he was mistaken, but of course, whatever I did to show him might have alarmed him too much.”

“All those Aiel.” Seonid’s voice was tight; she was Cairhienin. “Men and women. I think they would have tried to spear us if we blinked too quickly. One, a sun-haired woman who was at least wearing skirts, made no effort at all to hide her dislike.”

At times, Merana thought, Seonid did not fully realize that al’Thor himself might be a danger.

Alanna unconsciously began chewing her underlip like a girl. It was good she had Verin to take care of her; she was not fit to be out alone in her state. Verin merely sipped her tea and watched; Verin’s eyes could be most disconcerting.

Merana found herself relenting. She remembered too well the fragile bundle of nerves she had been after Baran. “Fortunately, it seems there may be a good side to his suspicion. He has received emissaries from Elaida, in Cairhien. He was quite open about it. Suspicion will make him keep them at a long arm’s length, I believe.”

Seonid rested her cup in its saucer. “He thinks to play us one against the other.”

“And he might still,” Masuri said dryly, “except that we know more of him than Elaida possibly can. I think she must have sent her envoys to meet a shepherd, if a shepherd in a silk coat. Whatever he is, he is no longer that. Moiraine taught him well, it seems.”

“We were forearmed,” Merana said. “I think it unlikely they were.”

Alanna stared at them, blinking. “Then I have not ruined everything?” They all three nodded, and she took a deep breath, then smoothed at her skirts with a frown as if just noticing the wrinkles. “I may yet be able to make him accept me.” The wrinkles were abandoned, and her face and voice became calmer and more confident by the word. “As for his amnesty, we may have to hold any plans in abeyance, but that doesn’t mean we should not make them. That sort of danger cannot be ignored.”

For a moment Merana regretted her relenting. The woman had done that to a man and all that truly worried her was whether it damaged their chances of success. Reluctantly, though, she admitted that had it made al’Thor biddable, she would have held her nose, and her tongue. “First we must bring al’Thor to heel, so to speak. The abeyance will last as long as it must, Alanna.” Alanna’s mouth tightened, but after a moment she nodded in acquiescence. Or at least assent.

“And how is he to be brought to heel?” Verin asked. “He must be handled delicately. A wolf on a leash one thread thick.”

Merana hesitated. She had not meant to share everything with this pair, who had only the most tenuous allegiance to the Hall in Salidar. She dreaded what would happen if Verin tried to take over here, if in fact she did manage to take over. She herself knew how to handle this; she had been chosen because of a lifetime spent mediating sensitive disputes, negotiating treaties where the hatreds seemed implacable. That agreements were broken eventually and treaties violated was the nature of humanity, yet in forty-six years, the Fifth Treaty of Falme was her only real failure. She knew all of that, but all of those years had ingrained some instincts deeply. “We are approaching certain nobles, who by good luck are all in Caemlyn now . . . “

“My worry is Elayne,” Dyelin said firmly. The more firmly for being alone in the sitting room with an Aes Sedai; Aes Sedai could press hard if you weakened when you were alone. Especially when no one else knew you were alone with her.

Kairen Sedai smiled, but neither smile nor cool blue eyes gave away anything. “It is quite possible the Daughter-Heir will yet be found to sit on the Lion Throne. What may seem insurmountable to others is seldom so to Aes Sedai.”

“The Dragon Reborn says — ”

“Men say many things, Lady Dyelin, but you know I do not lie.”

Luan patted the Tairen stallion’s gray neck, looking both ways in case one of the grooms came into the stables, and barely dodged a bite from wicked teeth. Rafela’s Warder would give warning, but Luan was not sure he trusted anyone of late. Especially not with a visit of this sort. “I am not sure I understand,” he said curtly.

“Unity is better than division,” Rafela said, “peace better than war, patience better than death.” Luan’s head jerked at the odd end to the platitudes, and the round-faced Aes Sedai smiled. “Will Andor not be better off if Rand al’Thor leaves the land in peace and unity, Lord Luan?”

Holding her robe shut, Ellorien stared at the Aes Sedai who had managed to reach her in her bath without being announced, possibly without being seen. The coppery-skinned woman looked back from the stool on the other side of the marble tub full of water as though this were all natural and ordinary. “Who,” Ellorien asked finally, “would have the Lion Throne then, Demira Sedai?”

“The Wheel weaves as the Wheel wills” was the reply, and Ellorien knew she would get no other.

Chapter 44

The Color of Trust

* * *

Once Vanin was gone to tell the Band to sit tight, Mat found that not an inn remained in Salidar but was taken over by Aes Sedai, and the five stables were all full to bursting. Yet when he slipped a little silver to a narrow-jawed stableman, the fellow had the sacks of oats and bales of hay shifted from a stone-walled yard that was fine for six horses. He also showed Mat and the remaining four men of the Band places to sleep in the loft, which was little cooler than anywhere else.

“Ask for nothing,” Mat told his men as he divided the rest of his coins among them. “Pay for everything, and accept no gifts. The Band isn’t going to be beholden to anybody here.”

His false air of confidence communicated itself to them, and they did not even hesitate when he ordered them to fix the banners out the loft door so they hung down in front of the stable, crimson and white, the black-and-white disc and the Dragon plain to everybody. On the other hand, the stableman’s eyes bulged, and they almost danced as they demanded to know what Mat was doing.

He only grinned and tossed the narrow-jawed fellow a gold mark. “Just letting everybody know for sure who’s come to call.” He wanted Egwene to realize he was not going to be pushed around, and sometimes making people see that meant you had to act like jack-fool.

The trouble was, the banners had no effect. Oh, everybody who walked by gaped and pointed; a number of Aes Sedai came just to look, cool-eyed and expressionless, but he more than half expected an indignant demand to take them down, and that never materialized. When he returned to the Little Tower, an Aes Sedai who somehow managed to be prune-faced despite smooth ageless cheeks shifted her brown-fringed shawl and told him in no uncertain terms that the Amyrlin Seat was busy; perhaps she could see him in a day or two. Perhaps. Elayne appeared to have vanished, and so did Aviendha, but no one was crying murder yet; he suspected the Aiel might be somewhere having a white dress pulled over her head. All the same to him if it kept the peace; he did not want to be the one to tell Rand one had killed the other. He did catch a sight of Nynaeve, but she ducked around a corner and was gone by the time he reached it.

He spent most of the afternoon looking for Thom and Juilin; either one surely could tell him more of what was going on, and besides, he needed to apologize to Thom for his remarks about that letter. Unfortunately nobody seemed to know where they were either. Long before nightfall he concluded that they were being kept out of his way. Egwene really did mean for him to stew, but he intended to let her know he was not even simmering. In aid of that, he went dancing.

It seemed that celebrations over a new Amyrlin were supposed to go on for a month, and though everyone in Salidar seemed to be working at a run during the day, once darkness fell bonfires were lit at every street crossing, and fiddles and flutes appeared and even a dulcimer or two. Music and laughter filled the air, and festival reigned until bedtime. He saw Aes Sedai dancing in the streets with carters and stablemen still in their rough clothes, and Warders dancing with serving women and cooks who had put aside their aprons. No Egwene, though; the Amyrlin bloody Seat was not going to caper in the streets. No Elayne or Nynaeve, either, and no Thom or Juilin. Thom would not have missed a dance with both legs broken unless he was deliberately kept away. Mat settled down to enjoy himself, to let everybody see he had not a care in the world. It did not work exactly as he wished.

He danced a short time with the most beautiful woman he had ever seen in his life, a slim yet buxom armful who wanted to know all about Mat Cauthon. Very flattering, especially when she had asked him to step out. But after a while he noticed that Halima had a way of brushi

ng against him, a way of leaning to look at something so he could not help seeing down her dress. He might have enjoyed it, if not for the fact that she glanced at his face every time with a sharp eye and an amused smile. She was not a very good dancer — she kept trying to lead, for one thing — and he finally begged off.

It should have been nothing, but before he had gone ten paces the foxhead went icy cold on his chest. He spun around, looking furiously for anything at all. What he saw was Halima staring at him in the firelight. Only for an instant before she seized a tall Warder’s arm and whirled back into the dance, but he was sure he had seen shock on that beautiful face.

The fiddles were wailing a tune he recognized. At least, one of his old memories did, not very much changed considering the passage of well over a thousand years. The words must have changed altogether, for the old words that echoed in his head would never have found favor here.

Give me your trust, said the Aes Sedai.

On my shoulders I support the sky.

Trust me to know and to do what is best,

And I will take care of the rest.

But trust is the color of a dark seed growing.

Trust is the color of a heart’s blood flowing.

Trust is the color of a soul’s last breath.

Trust is the color of death.

“Aes Sedai?” a plump young woman said contemptuously to his question. She was pretty, and he might have tried for a bit of kiss and cuddle in different circumstances. “Halima’s just Delana Sedai’s secretary. Always teasing the men, she is. Like a child with a new toy; teasing just to see if she can. She’d be in hot water to her neck ten times over if Delana didn’t protect her.”

Give me your trust, said the queen on her throne,

for I must bear the burden all alone.

Trust me to lead and to judge and to rule,