The Shadow Rising (The Wheel of Time 4)

“I am not a child!” She stamped her foot angrily, and almost fell. The floor was lower than it looked. “Not a child. You will tell me. Now!”

Thom sighed and shook his head. At last he said stiffly, “I was not always a gleeman. I was a bard, once. A Court-bard. In Caemlyn, as it happens. For Queen Morgase. You were a child. You are just remembering things wrong, that’s all.”

“You were her lover, weren’t you?” The flinch of his eyes was enough. “You were! I always knew about Gareth Bryne. At least, I figured it out. But I always hoped she would marry him. Gareth Bryne, and you, and this Lord Gaebril Mat said she looks calf-eyes at now, and … . How many more? How many? What makes her any different from Berelain, tripping every man who catches her eye into her bed. She is no different—” Her vision shivered, and her head rang. It took her a moment to realize he had slapped her. Slapped her! She drew herself up, wishing he would not sway. “How dare you? I am Daughter-Heir of Andor, and I will not be—”

“You are a little girl with a skinful of wine throwing a temper tantrum,” he snapped. “And if I ever hear you say anything like that about Morgase again, drunk or sober, I’ll put you over my knee however you channel! Morgase is a fine woman, as good as any there is!”

“Is she?” Her voice quavered, and she realized she was crying. “Then why did she—? Why—?” Somehow she had her face buried against his coat, and he was smoothing her hair.

“Because it is lonely being a queen,” he said softly. “Because most men attracted to a queen see power, not a woman. I saw a woman, and she knew it. I suppose Bryne saw the same in her, and this Gaebril, too. You have to understand, child. Everyone wants someone in their life, someone who cares for them, someone they can care for. Even a queen.”

“Why did you go away?” she mumbled into his chest. “You made me laugh. I remember that. You made her laugh, too. And you rode me on your shoulder.”

“A long story.” He sighed painfully. “I will tell you another time. If you ask. With luck, you’ll forget this by morning. It’s time for you to go to bed, Elayne.”

He guided her to the door, and she took the opportunity to tug at his mustache again. “Like that,” she said with satisfaction. “I used to pull it just like that.”

“Yes, you did. Can you make it downstairs by yourself?”

“Of course I can.” She gave him her haughtiest stare, but he looked readier than ever to follow her into the hall. To prove there was no need, she walked—carefully—as far as the head of the stairs. He was still frowning at her worriedly from the doorway when she started down.

Luckily she did not stumble until she was out of his sight, but she did walk right by her door and had to come back. Something must have been wrong with that apple jelly; she knew she should not have eaten so much of it. Lini always said … . She could not remember what it was Lini said, but something about eating too many sweets.

There were two lamps burning in the room, one on the small round table by the bed and the other on the white-plastered mantel above the brick fireplace. Nynaeve lay stretched out on the bed atop the coverlet, fully dressed. With her elbows stuck out, Elayne noted.

She said the first thing that came into her head. “Rand must think I’m crazy, Thom is a bard, and Morgase isn’t my mother after all.” Nynaeve gave her the oddest look. “I am a little dizzy for some reason. A nice boy with sweet brown eyes offered to help me upstairs.”

“I will wager he did,” Nynaeve said, biting off each word. Rising, she came to put an arm around Elayne’s shoulders. “Come over here a moment. There’s something I think you should see.” It appeared to be a bucket of extra water by the washstand. “Here. We’ll both kneel down so you can look.”

Elayne did, but there was nothing in the bucket but her own reflection in the water. She wondered why she was grinning that way. Then Nynaeve’s hand went to the back of her neck, and her head was in the water.

Flailing her hands, she tried to straighten up, but Nynaeve’s arm was like an iron bar. You were supposed to hold your breath under water. Elayne knew you were. She just could not remember how. All she could do was flail and gurgle and choke.

Nynaeve hauled her up, water streaming down her face, and she filled her lungs. “How dare—you,” she gasped. “I am—the Daughter-Heir of—” She managed to get out one wail before her head went back in with a splash. Seizing the bucket with both hands and pushing did no good. Drumming her feet on the floor did no good. She was going to drown. Nynaeve was going to drown her.

After an Age she was back out in the air again. Sodden strands of hair hung all across her face. “I think,” she said in the steadiest voice she could find, “that I am going to sick up.”

Nynaeve got the big white-glazed basin down from the washstand just in time, and held Elayne’s head while she brought up everything she had ever eaten in her life. A year later—well, hours anyway; it seemed that long—Nynaeve was washing her face and wiping her mouth, bathing her hands and wrists. There was nothing solicitous in her voice, though.

“How could you do this? Whatever possessed you? I might expect a fool man to drink until he can’t stand, but you! And tonight.”

“I only had one cup,” Elayne muttered. Even with that young man refilling it, she could not have had more than two. Surely not.

“A cup the size of a pitcher.” Nynaeve sniffed, helping her to her feet. Hauling her, really. “Can you stay awake? I am going to look for Egwene, and I still don’t trust myself to get out of Tel’aran’rhiod without someone to wake me.”

Elayne blinked at her. They had looked for Egwene, unsuccessfully, every night since she had disappeared so abruptly out of that meeting in the Heart of the Stone. “Stay awake? Nynaeve, it is my turn to look, and better it’s me. You know you cannot channel unless you are angry, and … .” She realized the other woman was surrounded by the glow of saidar. And had been for some time, she thought. Her own head felt stuffed full of wool; thought had to burrow through. She could barely sense the True Source. “Maybe you had better go. I will stay awake.”

Nynaeve frowned at her, but finally nodded. Elayne tried to help undress her, but her fingers did not seem to work very well when it came to those little buttons. Grumping under her breath, Nynaeve managed on her own. In only her shift, she threaded the twisted stone ring onto the leather cord she wore hanging around her neck, alongside a man’s ring, heavy and golden. That was Lan’s ring; Nynaeve always wore it between her breasts.

Elayne pulled a low wooden stool over beside

the bed while Nynaeve stretched out again. She did feel rather sleepy, but she would not fall asleep sitting on that. The problem seemed to be not falling on the floor. “I will judge an hour and wake you.”

Nynaeve nodded, then closed her eyes, both hands clutched around the two rings. After a time her breathing deepened.

The Heart of the Stone was quite empty. Peering into the dimness among the great columns, Nynaeve had circled Callandor, sparkling out of the floorstones, completely before she realized she was still in her shift, the leather cord dangling about her neck with the two rings. She frowned, and after a moment she was wearing a Two Rivers dress of good brown wool, and stout shoes. Elayne and Egwene both seemed to find this sort of thing easy, but it was not easy for her. There had been embarrassing moments in earlier visits to Tel’aran’rhiod, mostly after stray thoughts of Lan, but changing her garb deliberately took concentration. Just that—remembering—and her dress was silk, and as transparent as Rendra’s veil. Berelain would have blushed. So did Nynaeve, thinking of Lan seeing her in it. It took an effort to bring the brown wool back.

Worse, her anger had faded—that fool girl; did she not realize what happened when you drank too much wine? Had she never been alone in a common room before? Well, possibly she had not—and the True Source might as well not exist so far as she was concerned. Perhaps it would not matter. Uneasy, she stared into the forest of huge redstone columns, turning in one spot. What had made Egwene leave here abruptly?