That was a little secret that the Seanchan themselves did not know, or hid well if they did. Their damane were women born with the spark, women who would channel eventually even if untaught. But the sul’dam, who controlled the damane—they were the women who needed to be taught. The Seanchan thought that women who could channel were dangerous animals who had to be controlled, and yet unknowingly gave many of them honored positions.
“I do not understand this interest in the Seanchan.” Amys said the name awkwardly; she had never heard it until Elayne spoke it at their last meeting. “What they do is terrible, but they are gone. Rand al’Thor defeated them, and they fled.”
Egwene turned her back and stared at the huge polished columns running off into shadow. “Gone is not to say they will never come back.” She did not want them to see her face, not even Elayne. “We must know whatever we can learn, in case they ever return.” They had put an a’dam on her in Falme. They had meant to send her over the Aryth Ocean to Seanchan, to spend the rest of her life as a dog on a leash. Fury welled up in her every time she thought of them. And fear, too. The fear that if they did return, they would succeed in taking and holding her this time. That was what she could not allow them to see. The stark terror that she knew was in her eyes.
Elayne put a hand on her arm. “We will be ready for them if they do come back,” she said gently. “They will not find us in surprise and ignorance again.” Egwene patted her hand, though she wanted to clutch it; Elayne understood more than Egwene wished, yet it was comforting that she did.
“Let us finish what we are here for,” Bair said briskly. “You need to be asleep in truth, Egwene.”
“We had the gai’shain undress you, and put you in your blankets.” Surprisingly, Amys sounded as gentle as Elayne. “When you return to your body, you can sleep until morning.”
Egwene’s cheeks colored. Given Aiel ways, it was as likely as not that some of those gai’shain had been men. She would have to speak to them about that—delicately, of course; they would not understand, and it was not a thing she could be comfortable explaining.
The fear was gone, she realized. Apparently I’m more afraid of being embarrassed than I am of the Seanchan. It was not true, but she held to the thought.
There was really little to tell Elayne. That they were in Cairhien finally, that Couladin had devastated Selean and ravaged the surrounding land, that the Shaido were still days ahead and moving west. The Wise Ones knew more than she; they had not taken to their tents straightaway. There had been skirmishes in the evening, small ones and only a few, with mounted men who quickly fled, and other men on horses who had been sighted ran without fighting. There had been no prisoners taken. Moiraine and Lan seemed to think that the riders could have been bandits, or supporters of one or another of the Houses trying to claim the Sun Throne. All had been equally ragged. Whoever they were, word would soon spread that there were more Aiel in Cairhien.
“They had to learn sooner or later” was Elayne’s only comment.
Egwene watched Elayne as she and the Wise Ones faded away—to her it seemed as though Elayne and the Heart of the Stone became more and more attenuated—but her golden-haired friend gave no sign as to whether she had understood the message.
CHAPTER
25
Dreams of Galad
Instead of returning to her own body, Egwene floated in darkness. She seemed to be darkness herself, without substance. Whether her body lay up or down or sideways from her, she did not know—there was no direction here—but she knew that it was near, that she could step into it easily. All around her in the blackness, fireflies seemingly twinkled, a vast horde fading away into unimaginable distance. Those were dreams, dreams of the Aiel in the camp, dreams of men and women across Cairhien, across the world, all glittering there.
She could pick out some among the nearer and name the dreamer, now. In one way those sparkles were just as alike as fireflies—that was what had given her so much trouble in the beginning—but in another, somehow, they now seemed as individual as faces. Rand’s dreams, and Moiraine’s, appeared muted, dimmed by the wards they had woven. Amys’ and Bair’s were bright and regular in their pulsing; they had taken their own advice, apparently. Had she not seen those, she would have been into her body in an instant. Those two could rove this darkness much more ably than she; she would not have known they were there until they pounced on her. If she ever learned to recognize Elayne and Nynaeve in the same way, she would be able to find them in that great constellation wherever they were in the world. But tonight she did not mean to observe anyone’s dream.
Carefully she formed a well-remembered image in her mind, and she was back in Tel’aran’rhiod, inside the small, windowless room in the Tower where she had lived as a novice. A narrow bed was built against one white-painted wall. A washstand and a three-legged stool stood opposite the door, and the current occupant’s dresses and shifts of white wool hung with a white cloak on pegs. There could as easily have been none; the Tower had not been able to fill the novices’ quarters in many years. The floor was almost as pale as walls and clothes. Every day the novice who lived there would scrub that floor on hands and knees; Egwene had done so herself, and Elayne, in the next room. If a queen came to train in the Tower, she would start in a room like this, scrubbing the floor.
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nbsp; The garments were arranged differently when she glanced at them again, but she ignored that. Ready to embrace saidar in a heartbeat, she opened the door just enough to stick her head out. And drew a relieved breath when she found Elayne’s head coming just as slowly out of the next doorway. Egwene hoped she did not appear as wide-eyed and uncertain. She motioned hurriedly, and Elayne scurried across in novice white that became a pale gray silk riding dress as she darted inside. Egwene hated gray dresses; that was what damane wore.
For an instant more she stayed there, scanning the railed galleries of the novices’ quarters. Layer on layer they rose, and fell as many levels to the Novices’ Court below. Not that she really expected Liandrin or worse to be out there, but it never hurt to be careful.
“I thought this was what you meant,” Elayne said as she shut the door. “Do you have any idea how difficult it is to remember what I can say in front of whom? Sometimes I wish we could just tell the Wise Ones everything. Let them know we are only Accepted, and be done with it.”
“You would be done with it,” Egwene said firmly. “I happen to be sleeping not twenty paces from them.”
Elayne shivered. “That Bair. She reminds me of Lini when I’d broken something I was not supposed to touch.”
“You wait until I introduce you to Sorilea.” Elayne gave her a doubtful look, but then, Egwene was not sure that she would have believed Sorilea herself until she met her. There was no way to do this easily. She shifted her shawl. “Tell me about meeting Birgitte. It was Birgitte, wasn’t it?”
Elayne staggered as if hit in the stomach. Her blue eyes closed for a moment, and she took a breath that must have filled her to the toes. “I cannot talk to you about that.”
“What do you mean you can’t talk? You have a tongue. Was it Birgitte?”
“I cannot, Egwene. You must believe me. I would if I could, but I cannot. Perhaps . . . I can ask . . .” If Elayne had been the kind of woman to wring her hands, she would have been doing it then. Her mouth opened and closed without any words coming out; her eyes darted around the room as if seeking inspiration or aid. Taking a deep breath, she fixed an urgent blue gaze on Egwene. “Anything I say violates confidences I promised to hold. Even that. Please, Egwene. You must trust me. And you must not tell anyone what you . . . think you saw.”
Egwene forced the stern frown from her face. “I will trust you.” At least she knew now for a fact that she had not been seeing things. Birgitte? Light! “I hope that one day you will trust me enough to tell me.”
“I do trust you, but . . .” Shaking her head, Elayne sat down on the edge of the neatly made bed. “We keep secrets too often, Egwene, but sometimes there is a reason.”
After a moment Egwene nodded and sat next to her. “When you can,” was all she said, but her friend gave her a relieved hug.