Towers of Midnight (The Wheel of Time 13)

Perrin growled. He nearly jumped away to confront Slayer again, but a caution from Hopper stopped him. Too soon! You must learn!

"It's not only him," P

errin said. "I need to look at the area around my camp and that of the Whitecloaks. Something smells wrong there in the waking world. I need to see if something is odd there."

Odd? Hopper sent the image of the dome.

"It is probably related." The two oddities seemed likely to be more than mere coincidence.

Search another time. Slayer is too strong for you.

Perrin took a deep breath. "I have to face him eventually, Hopper."

Not now.

"No," Perrin agreed. "Not now. Now we practice." He turned to the wolf. "As we will do every night until I am ready."

Rodel Ituralde rolled over in his cot, neck slick with sweat. Had Saldaea always been this hot and muggy? He wished for home, the cool ocean breezes of Bandar Eban.

Things felt wrong. Why hadn't the Shadowspawn attacked? A hundred possibilities rattled in his mind. Were they waiting for new siege engines? Were they scouting out forests in order to build them? Or were their commanders content with a siege? The entire city was surrounded, but there had to be enough Trollocs out there to overwhelm it now.

They had taken to beating drums. All hours. Thump, thump, thump. Steady, like the heartbeat of an enormous animal, the Great Serpent itself, coiling around the city.

Dawn was beginning to shine outside. He hadn't turned in until well after midnight. Durhem who commanded the morning watch had ordered that Ituralde not be disturbed until noon. His tent was in a shadowed alcove of the courtyard. He had wanted to be close to the wall, and had refused a bed. That had been foolish. Though a cot had been fine for him in previous years, he wasn't as young as he'd once been. Tomorrow, he'd move.

Now, he told himself, sleep.

It wasn't that easy The accusation that he was Dragonsworn left him unsettled. In Arad Doman, he'd been fighting for his king, someone he'd believed in. Now he was fighting in a foreign land for a man he'd met only once. All because of a gut feeling.

Light, but it was hot. Sweat ran down his cheeks, making his neck itch. It shouldn't be this hot so early in the morning. It wasn't natural. Those burning drums, still pounding.

He sighed, climbing off his sweat-dampened cot. His leg ached. It had for days now.

You're an old man, Rodel, he thought, stripping off his sweaty smallclothes and getting out some freshly washed ones. He stuffed his trousers into knee-high riding boots. A simple white shirt with black buttons went on next, and then his gray coat, buttoning straight up to the collar.

He was strapping on his sword when he heard hurried footsteps outside, followed by whispers. That conversation grew heated, and he stepped outside just as someone said, "Lord Ituralde will wish to know!"

"Know what?" Ituralde asked. A messenger boy was arguing with his guards. All three turned toward him sheepishly.

"I'm sorry, my Lord," Connel said. "We were instructed to let you sleep."

"A man who can sleep in this heat must be half-lizard, Connel," Ituralde said. "Lad, what's the word?"

"Captain Yoeli is on the wall, sir," the youth said. Ituralde recognized the young man he'd been with him from near the beginning of this campaign. "He said you should come."

Ituralde nodded. He laid a hand on Connel's arm. "Thank you for watching me, old friend, but these bones aren't so frail as you think."

Connel nodded, blushing. The guard fell into place behind as Ituralde crossed the courtyard. The sun had risen. Many of his troops were up. Too many. He wasn't the only one having difficulty sleeping.

Atop the wall, he was greeted by a disheartening sight. On the dying land, thousand upon thousands of Trollocs camped, burning fires. Ituralde didn't like to think about where the wood for those fires came from. Hopefully all of the nearby homesteaders and villagers had heeded the call to evacuate.

Yoeli stood gripping the crenelated stone of the wall, next to a man in a black coat. Deepe Bhadar was senior among the Asha'man whom al'Thor had given him, one of only three who wore both the Dragon and the sword pins on his collar. The Andoran man had a flat face and black hair that he wore long. Ituralde had sometimes heard some of the black-coated men mumbling to themselves, but not Deepe. He seemed fully in control.

Yoeli kept glancing at the Asha'man; Ituralde didn't feel comfortable with men who could channel either. But they were an excellent tool, and they hadn't failed him. He preferred to let'experience, instead of rumor, rule him.

"Lord Ituralde," Deepe said. The Asha'man never saluted Ituralde, just al'Thor.

"What is it?" Ituralde asked, scanning the hordes of Trollocs. They didn't seem to have changed since he'd bedded down.