The Shadow Rising (The Wheel of Time 4)

“Nothing that makes sense,” Mat muttered. “What about you?”

Suddenly Moiraine appeared from the ter’angreal, seeming to step gracefully out of thin air, flowing out. She would be a fine one to dance with if she were not Aes Sedai. Her mouth tightened at the sight of them.

“You! You were both in there. That is why … !” She made a vexed hiss. “One of you would have been bad enough, but two ta’veren at once—you might have torn the connection entirely and been trapped there. Wretched boys playing with things you do not know the danger of. Perrin! Is Perrin in there, too? Did he share your … exploit?”

“The last I saw of Perrin,” Mat said, “he was getting ready to go bed.” Maybe Perrin would give him the lie by being the next to step out of the thing, but he might as well deflect the Aes Sedai’s anger if he could. No need for Perrin to face it, too. Maybe he’ll make it clear of her, at least, if he gets away before she knows what he’s doing. Bloody woman! I’ll wager she was noble born.

That Moraine was angry there was no doubt. The blood had drained out of her cheeks, and her eyes were dark augers boring into Rand. “At least you escaped with your lives. Who told you of this? Which one of them? I will make her wish I had peeled off her hide like a glove.”

“A book told me,” Rand said calmly. He sat down back on the edge of a crate that creaked alarmingly under his weight and crossed his arms. All very cool; Mat wished he could emulate it. “A pair of books, in fact. Treasures of the Stone and Dealings with the Territory of Mayene. Surprising what you can dig out of books if you read long enough, isn’t it?”

“And you?” She shifted that drilling gaze to Mat. “Did you read it in a book, too? You?”

“I do read sometimes,” he said dryly. He would not have been averse to a little hide-peeling for Egwene and Nynaeve after what they had done to make him tell where he had hidden the Amyrlin’s letter—tying him up with the Power was bad enough, but the rest!—yet it was more fun to tweak Moiraine’s nose. “Treasures. Dealings. Lots of things in books.” Luckily, she did not insist that he repeat the titles; he had not paid attention once Rand brought up books.

Instead she swung back to Rand. “And your answers?”

“Are mine,” Rand replied, then frowned. “It wasn’t easy, though. They brought a … woman … to interpret, but she talked like an old book. I could hardly understand some of the words. I never considered they might speak another language.”

“The Old Tongue,” Moiraine told him. “They use the Old Tongue—a rather harsh dialect of it—for their dealings with men. And you, Mat? Was your interpreter easily understood?”

He had to work moisture back into his mouth. “The Old Tongue? Is that what it was? They didn’t give me one. In fact, I never got to ask any questions. That bell started shaking the walls down, and they hustled me out like I was tracking cow manure on the rugs.” She was still staring, her eyes still digging into his head. She knew about the Old Tongue slipping out of him, sometimes. “I … almost understood a word here and there, but not to know it. You and Rand got answers. What do they get out of it? The snakes with legs. We aren’t going upstairs to find ten years gone, are we, like Bili in the story?”

“Sensations,” Moiraine replied with a grimace. “Sensations, emotions, experiences. They rummage through them; you can feel them doing it, making your skin crawl. Perhaps they feed on them in some manner. The Aes Sedai who studied this ter’angreal when it was in Mayene wrote of a strong desire to bathe afterward. I certainly intend to.”

“But their answers are true?” Rand said as she started to turn away. “You are sure of it? The books implied as much, but can they really give true answers about the future?”

“The answers are true,” Moiraine said slowly, “so long as they are in regard to your own future. That much is certain.” She watched Rand, and himself, weighing the effect of her words. “As to how, though, there is only speculation. That world is … folded … in strange ways. I cannot be clearer. It may be that that allows them to read the thread of a human life, read the various ways it may yet be woven into the Pattern. Or perhaps it is a talent of the people. The answers are often obscure, however. If you need help working out what yours mean, I offer my services.” Her eyes flickered from one of them to the other, and Mat nearly swore. She did not believe him about no answers. Unless it was simply general Aes Sedai suspicion.

Rand gave her a slow smile. “And will you tell me what you asked, and what they answered?”

For answer, she returned a level, searching look, then started for the door. A small ball of light, as bright as a lantern, was suddenly floating ahead of her, illuminating her way.

Mat knew he should leave it alone, now. Just let her go and hope she forgot he had ever been down here. But a knot of anger still burned inside him. All those ridiculous things they had said. Well, maybe they were true, if Moiraine said so, but he wanted to grab those fellows by the collar, or whatever passed for a collar in those wrappings, and make them explain a few things.

“Why can’t you go there twice, Moiraine?” he called after her. “Why not?” He very nearly asked why they worried about iron and musical instruments, too, and bit his tongue. He could not know about those if he had not understood what they were saying.

She paused at the door to the hall, and it was impossible to see if she was looking at the ter’angreal or at Rand. “If I knew everything, Matrim, I would not need to ask questions.” She peered into the room a moment longer—she was staring at Rand—then glided away without another word.

For a time Mat and Rand looked at each other in silence.

“Did you find out what you wanted?” Rand asked finally.

“Did you?”

A bright flame leaped into existence, balanced above Rand’s palm. Not the smooth glowing sphere of the Aes Sedai, but a rough blaze like a torch. As Rand moved to leave, Mat added another question. “Are you really going to just let the Whitecloaks do whatever they want back home? You know they’re heading for Emond’s Field. If they are not there already. Yellow eyes, the bloody Dragon Reborn. It’s too much, otherwise.”

“Perrin will do … what he has to do to save Emond’s Field,” Rand replied in a pained voice. “And I must do what I have to, or more than Emond’s Field will fall, and to worse than Whitecloaks.”

Mat stood watching the light of that flame fade away down the hall, until he remembered where he was. Then he snatched up his lamp and hurried out. Rhuidean! Light, what am I going to do?

CHAPTER 16

Leavetakings

Lying on sweat-soaked sheets, staring at the ceiling, Perrin realized that the darkness was turning to gray. Soon the sun would be edging above the horizon. Morning. A time for new hopes; a time to be up and doing. New hopes. He almost laughed. How long had he been awake? An hour or more, surely, this time. Scratching his curly beard, he winced. His bruised shoulder had stiffened, and he sat up slowly; sweat popped out on his face as he worked the arm. He kept at it methodically, though, suppressing groans and now and again biting back a curse, until he could move the arm freely, if not comfortably.

Such sleep as he had managed had been broken and fitful. When he was awake he had seen Faile’s face, her dark eyes accusing him, the hurt he had put there making him cringe inside. When he slept, he dreamed of mounting a gallows, and Faile watching, or worse, trying to stop it, trying to fight Whitecloaks with their lances and swords, and he was screaming while they fitted the noose around his neck, screaming because the Whitecloaks were killing Faile. Sometimes she watched them hang him with a smile of angry satisfaction. Small wonder such dreams wakened him with a jerk. Once he had dreamed of wolves running out of the forest to save both Faile and him—only to be spitted on Whitecloak lances, shot down by their arrows. It had not been a restful night. Washing and dressing as hurriedly