Egwene opened her eyes to a comfortably dark room, making plans to gathet the Hall and explain why Shevan and Carlinya would never awaken. She spared a moment to mourn for them as she sat up. She'd explained to them the dangers, but still she felt as if she'd failed them. And Nicola, always ttying to go faster than she should. She shouldn't have been there. It
Egwene hesitated. What was that smell? Hadn't she left a lamp burning? It must have gone out. Egwene embraced the Source and wove a ball of light to hang above her hand. She was stunned by the scene it revealed.
The translucent curtains of her bed had been sprayed red with blood, and five bodies littered the floor. Three were in black. One was an unfamiliar young man in the tabard of the Tower Guard. The last wore a fine white and red coat and trousers.
Gawyn!
Egwene threw herself from the bed and knelt beside him, ignoring the pain of het headache. He was breathing shallowly, and had a gaping wound in his side. She wove Earth, Spirit and Air into a Healing, but she was far from talented in this area. She worked on, in a panic. Some of his color returned and the wounds began to close, but she couldn't do nearly enough.
"Help!" she yelled. "The Amyrlin needs help!"
Gawyn stirred. "Egwene," he whispered, his eyes fluttering open.
"Hush, Gawyn. You're going to be fine. Aid! To the Amyrlin!"
"You . . . didn't leave enough lights on," he whispered.
"What?"
"The message I sent
"We never got a message," she said. "Be still. Help!" "Nobody is near. I yelled. The lamps ... it is good . . . you didn't . . ." He smiled dazedly. "I love you."
"Lie still," she said. Light! She was crying.
"The assassins weren't your Forsaken, though," he said, words slurring. "I was right."
And he had been; what were those unfamiliat black uniforms? Seanchan?
I should be dead, she realized. If Gawyn hadn't stopped these assassins, she'd have been murdered in her sleep and would have vanished from Tel'aran'rhiod. She'd never have killed Mesaana.
Suddenly, she felt a fool, any sense of victory completely evaporating.
"I'm sorry," Gawyn said closing his eyes, "for disobeying you." He was slipping.
"It's all right, Gawyn," she said, blinking away tears. "I'm going to bond you now. It's the only way."
His grip on her arm became slightly more firm. "No. Not unless . . . you want . . ."
"Fool," she said, preparing the weaves. "Of course I want you as my Warder. I always have." "Swear it."
"I swear it. I swear that I want you as my Warder, and as my husband." She rested her hand on his forehead and laid the weave on him. "I love you."
He gasped. Suddenly, she could feel his emotions, and his pain, as if they were her own. And, in return, she knew that he could feel the truth of her words.
Perrin opened his eyes and took a deep breath. He was crying. Did people cry in their sleep when they dreamed normal dreams?
"Light be praised," Faile said. He opened his eyes and found that she knelt next to him, as did someone else. Masuri?
The Aes Sedai grabbed Perrin's head in her hands, and Perrin felt the icy cold of a Healing wash across him. The wounds in his leg and across his chest closed.
"We tried to Heal you while you slept," Faile said, cradling Perrin's head in her lap. "But Edarra stopped us."
"It is not to be done. Wouldn't work anyway." That was the Wise One's voice. Perrin could hear her in the tent somewhere. He blinked his eyes. He lay on his pallet. It was dim outside.
"It's been longer than an hour," he said. "You should have left by now."
"Hush," Faile said. "Gateways are working again, and almost everyone is through. Only a few thousand soldiers remain Aiel and Two Rivers men, mostly. You think they'd leave, you think I'd leave, without you?"