The Great Hunt (The Wheel of Time 2)

Loial led his big mount over to him; with the Ogier standing on the ground, Loial’s head came almost to Rand’s shoulder, and him in his saddle. Loial still looked puzzled.

“You think we should stay here?” Rand said. “Try again to use the Stone? If the Darkfriends are here, in place, we have to find them. We can’t leave the Horn of Valere in Darkfriend hands; you heard the Amyrlin. And we have to get that dagger back. Mat will die without it.”

Loial nodded. “Yes, Rand, we do. But, Rand, the Stones. . . .”

“We will find another. You said they were scattered all over, and if they’re all like this—all this stonework around them—it should not be too hard to find one.”

“Rand, that fragment said the Stones came from an older Age than the Age of Legends, and even the Aes Sedai then did not understand them, though they used them, some of the truly powerful did. They used them with the One Power, Rand. How did you think to use this Stone to take us back? Or any other Stone we find?”

For a moment Rand could only stare at the Ogier, thinking faster than he ever had in his life. “If they are older than the Age of Legends, maybe the people who built them didn’t use the Power. There must be another way. The Darkfriends got here, and they certainly couldn’t use the Power. Whatever this other way is, I will find it out. I will get us back, Loial.” He looked at the tall stone column with its odd markings, and felt a prickle of fear. Light, if only I don’t have to use the Power to do it. “I will, Loial, I promise. One way or another.”

The Ogier gave a doubtful nod. He swung up onto his huge horse and followed Rand up the steps to join Hurin among the blackened trees.

The land stretched out, low and rolling, sparsely forested here and there with grassland between, crossed by more than one stream. In the middle distance Rand thought he could see another burned patch. It was all pale, the colors washed. There was no sign of anything made by men except the stone circle behind them. The sky was empty, no chimney smoke, no birds, only a few clouds and the pale yellow sun.

Worst of all, though, the land seemed to twist the eye. What was close at hand looked all right, and what was seen straight ahead in the distance. But whenever Rand turned his head, things that appeared distant when seen from the corner of his eye seemed to rush toward him, to be nearer when he stared straight at them. It made for dizziness; even the horses whickered nervously and rolled their eyes. He tried moving his head slowly; the apparent movement of things that should have been fixed was still there, but it seemed to help a little.

“Did your piece of a book say anything about this?” Rand asked.

Loial shook his head, then swallowed hard as if he wished he had kept it still. “Nothing.”

“I suppose there’s nothing to do for it. Which way, Hurin?”

“South, Lord Rand.” The sniffer

kept his eyes on the ground.

“South, then.” There has to be a way back besides using the Power. Rand heeled Red’s flanks. He tried to make his voice lighthearted, as if he saw no difficulty at all in what they were about. “What was it Ingtar said? Three or four days to that monument to Artur Hawkwing? I wonder if that exists here, too, the way the Stones do. If this is a world that could be, maybe it’s still standing. Wouldn’t that be something to see, Loial?”

They rode south.

CHAPTER

14

Wolfbrother

“Gone?” Ingtar demanded of the air. “And my guards saw nothing. Nothing! They cannot just be gone!”

Listening, Perrin hunched his shoulders and looked at Mat, who stood a little way off frowning and muttering to himself. Arguing with himself was how Perrin saw it. The sun was peeking over the horizon, past time for them to have been riding. Shadows lay long across the hollow, stretched out and thinned, but still like the trees that made them. The packhorses, loaded and on their lead line, stamped impatiently, but everyone stood by his mount and waited.

Uno came striding up. “Not a goat-kissing track, my Lord.” He sounded offended; failure touched on his skill. “Burn me, not so much as a flaming hoof scrape. They just bloody vanished.”

“Three men and three horses do not just vanish,” Ingtar growled. “Go over the ground again, Uno. If anyone can find where they went, it’s you.”

“Maybe they just ran away,” Mat said. Uno stopped and glared at him. Like he’d cursed an Aes Sedai, Perrin thought wonderingly.

“Why would they run away?” Ingtar’s voice was dangerously soft. “Rand, the Builder, my sniffer—my sniffer!—why would any of them run, much less all three?”

Mat shrugged. “I don’t know. Rand was. . . .” Perrin wanted to throw something at him, hit him, anything to stop him, but Ingtar and Uno were watching. He felt a flood of relief when Mat hesitated, then spread his hands and muttered, “I don’t know why. I just thought maybe they had.”

Ingtar grimaced. “Ran away,” he growled as if he did not believe it for an instant. “The Builder can go as he will, but Hurin would not run away. And neither would Rand al’Thor. He would not; he knows his duty, now. Go on, Uno. Search the ground again.” Uno gave a half bow and hurried away, sword hilt bobbing over his shoulder. Ingtar grumbled, “Why would Hurin leave like that, in the middle of the night, without a word? He knows what we’re about. How am I to track this Shadow-spawned filth without him? I would give a thousand gold crowns for a pack of trail hounds. If I did not know better, I would say the Darkfriends managed this so they can slip east or west without me knowing. Peace, I don’t know if I do know better.” He stumped off after Uno.

Perrin shifted uneasily. The Darkfriends were doubtless getting further away with every minute. Getting further away, and with them the Horn of Valere—and the dagger from Shadar Logoth. He did not think that Rand, whatever he had become, whatever had happened to him, would abandon that chase. But where did he go, and why? Loial might go with Rand for friendship—but why Hurin?

“Maybe he did run away,” he muttered, then looked around. No one appeared to have heard; even Mat was not paying him any mind. He scrubbed a hand through his hair. If Aes Sedai had been after him to be a false Dragon, he would have run, too. But worrying about Rand was doing nothing to help track the Darkfriends.

There was a way, perhaps, if he was willing to take it. He did not want to take it. He had been running away from it, but perhaps, now, he could no longer run. Serves me right for what I told Rand. I wish I could run. Even knowing what he could do to help—what he had to do—he hesitated.