But the flame-haired Aiel closest to her only said, “I am Bain, of the Black Rock sept of the Shaarad Aiel.”

“I am Chiad,” the shorter, blonder woman on her other side said, “of the Stones River sept of the Goshien Aiel.”

Bain and Chiad glanced at Egwene; their expressions did not change, but she had the feeling they thought she was showing bad manners.

“I am Egwene al’Vere,” she told them. They seemed to expect more, so she added, “Daughter of Marin al’Vere, of Emond’s Field, in the Two Rivers.” That seemed to satisfy them, in a way, but she would have bet they understood it no more than she did all these septs and clans. It must mean families, in some way.

“You are first-sisters?” Bain seemed to be taking in all three of them.

Egwene thought they must mean sisters as it was used for Aes Sedai, and said “Yes,” just as Elayne said “No.”

Chiad and Bain exchanged a very quick look that suggested they were talking to women who might not be completely whole in their minds.

“First-sister,” Elayne told Egwene as if she were lecturing, “means women who have the same mother. Second-sister means their mothers are sisters.” She turned her words to the Aiel. “We neither of us know a great deal of your people. I ask you to excuse our ignorance. I sometimes think of Egwene as a first-sister, but we are not blood kin.”

“Then why do you not speak the words before your Wise Ones?” Chiad asked. “Bain and I became first-sisters.”

Egwene blinked. “How can you become first-sisters? Either you have the same mother, or you do not. I do not mean to offend. Most of what I know about the Maidens of the Spear comes from the little Elayne has told me. I know you fight in battle and don’t care for men, but no more than that.” Elayne nodded; the way she had described the Maidens to Egwene had sounded much like a cross between female Warders and the Red Ajah.

That look flashed back across the Aiel’s faces, as if they were not certain how much sense Egwene and Elayne had.

“We do not care for men?” Chiad murmured as if puzzled.

Bain knotted her brow in thought. “What you say comes near truth, yet misses it completely. When we wed the spear, we pledge to be bound to no man or child. Some do give up the spear, for a man or a child”—her expression said she herself did not understand this—“but once given up, the spear cannot be taken back.”

“Or if she is chosen to go to Rhuidean,” Chiad put in. “A Wise One cannot be wedded to the spear.”

Bain looked at her as if she had announced the sky was blue, or that rain fell from clouds. The glance she gave Egwene and Elayne said perhaps they did not know these things. “Yes, that is true. Though some try to struggle against it.”

“Yes, they do.” Chiad sounded as though she and Bain were sharing something between them.

“But I have gone far from the trail of my explanation,” Bain went on. “The Maidens do not dance the spears with one another even when our clans do, but the Shaarad Aiel and the Goshien Aiel have held blood feud between them over four hundred years, so Chiad and I felt our wedding pledge was not enough. We went to speak the words before the Wise Ones of our clans—she risking her life in my hold, and I in hers—to bond us as first-sisters. As is proper for first-sisters who are Maidens, we guard each other’s backs, and neither will let a man come to her without the other. I would not say we do not care for men.” Chiad nodded, with just the hint of a smile. “Have I made the truth clear to you, Egwene?”

“Yes,” Egwene said faintly. She glanced at Elayne and saw the bewilderment in her blue eyes she knew must be in her own. Not Red Ajah. Green, maybe. A cross between Warders and Green Ajah, and I do not understand another thing out of that. “The truth is quite clear to me, now, Bain. Thank you.”

“If the two of you feel you are first-sisters,” Chiad said, “you should go to your Wise Ones and speak the words. But you are Wise Ones, though young. I do not know how it would be done in that case.”

Egwene did not know whether to laugh or blush. She kept having an image of her and Elayne sharing the same man. No, that is only for first-sisters who are Maidens of the Spear. Isn’t it? Elayne did have spots of color in her cheeks, and Egwene was sure she was thinking of Rand. But we do not share him, Elayne. We can neither of us have him.

Elayne cleared her throat. “I do not think there is a need for that, Chiad. Egwene and I already guard each other’s backs.”

“How can that be?” Chiad asked slowly. “You are not wedded to the spear. And you are Wise Ones. Who would lift a hand against a Wise One? This confuses me. What need have you for guarding of backs?”

Egwene was spared having to come up with an answer by their arrival at the copse. There were two more Aiel under the trees, deep into the thicket, but next to the river. Jolien, of the Salt Flat sept of the Nakai Aiel, a blue-eyed woman with red-gold hair nearly the color of Elayne’s, was watching over Dailin, of Aviendha’s sept and clan. Sweat matted Dailin’s hair, making it a darker red, and she only opened her gray eyes once, when they first came near, then closed them again. Her coat and shirt lay beside her, and red stained the bandages wrapped around her middle.

“She took a sword,” Aviendha said. “Some of those fools that the oath-breaking treekillers call soldiers thought we were another handful of the bandits who infest this land. We had to kill them to convince them otherwise, but Dailin. . . . Can you heal her, Aes Sedai?”

Nynaeve went to her knees beside the injured woman and lifted the bandages enough to peer under them. She winced at what she saw. “Have you moved her since she was hurt? There is scabbing, but it has been broken.”

“She wanted to die near water,” Aviendha said. She glanced once at the river, then quickly away again. Egwene thought she might have shivered, too.

“Fools!” Nynaeve began rummaging in her pouch of herbs. “You could have killed her moving her with an injury like that. She wanted to die near water!” she said disgustedly. “Just because you carry weapons like men doesn’t mean you have to think like them.” She pulled a deep wooden cup out of the bag and pushed it at Chiad. “Fill that. I need water to mix these so she can drink them.”

Chiad and Bain stepped to the river’s edge and returned together. Their faces never changed, but Egwene thought they had almost expected the river to reach up and grab them.

“If we had not brought her here to the . . . river, Aes Sedai,” Aviendha said, “we would never have found you, and she would have died anyway.”

Nynaeve snorted and began sifting powdered herbs into the cup of water, muttering to herself. “Corenroot helps make blood, and dogwort for knitting flesh, and healall, of course, and. . . .” Her mutters trailed off into w

Tags: Robert Jordan The Wheel of Time Fantasy
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