Yet if they held the mob, it was Galad who broke them. He faced their charge as though awaiting the next dance at a ball, arms folded and unconcerned, not even bothering to bare his blade until they were almost on top of him. Then he did dance, all his grace turned in an instant to fluid death. He did not stand against them; he carved a path into their heart, a clear swath as wide as his sword’s reach. Sometimes five or six men closed in around him with swords and axes and table legs for clubs, but only for the brief time it took them to die. In the end, all their rage, all their thirst for blood, could not face him. It was from him that the first ran, flinging away weapons, and when the rest fled, they divided around him. As they vanished back the way they had come, he stood twenty paces from anyone else, alone among the dead and the groans of the dying.

Nynaeve shivered as he bent to clean his blade on a corpse’s coat. He was graceful, even doing that. He was beautiful, even doing that. She thought she might sick up.

She had no idea how long it had taken. Some of the Shienarans were leaning on their swords, panting. And eyeing Galad with a good deal of respect. Thom was bent over with one hand on his knee, trying to fend Elayne off with the other while telling her he just had to catch his breath. Minutes, an hour; it could have been either.

For once, looking at the injured men lying on the pavement here and there, the one crawling away, she felt no desire to Heal, no pity at all. Not far off was a pitchfork, where someone had flung it; a man’s severed head was impaled on one tine, a woman’s on another. All she felt was queasy, and grateful that it was not her head. That, and cold.

“Thank you,” she said aloud, to no one in particular and to everyone. “Thank you very much.” The words grated a little—she did not like confessing something she had not been able to do for herself—but they were fervent. Then Birgitte nodded in acknowledgment, and Nynaeve had to struggle with herself. But the woman had done as much as anyone. Considerably more than she herself. She thrust her belt knife back into its sheath. “You . . . shot very well.”

With a wry grin, as if she knew exactly how difficult those words had been, Birgitte set about recovering her arrows. Nynaeve shuddered and tried not to watch.

Most of the Shienarans had wounds, and Thom and Juilin both wore their own blood in places—miraculously, Galad was untouched; or perhaps not so miraculously, remembering how he had handled his sword—but, manlike to the bitter end, every one of them insisted that his hurts were not serious. Even Uno said they had to keep moving, him with one arm hanging and a gash down the side of his face whose scar would nearly mirror the first if it was not Healed soon.

In truth, she was not reluctant to go, despite telling herself that she should be seeing to injuries. Elayne put a supporting arm around Thom; he responded by refusing to lean on her and beginning to recite a tale in High Chant, so flowery it was difficult to recognize the story of Kirukan, the beautiful soldier queen of the Trolloc Wars.

“She had a temper like a boar caught in briars at the best,” Birgitte said softly to no one in particular. “Not at all like anyone close by.”

Nynaeve ground her teeth. Catch her complimenting the woman again, no matter what she did. Come to think of it, any man in the Two Rivers could have shot as well at that range. Any boy.

Rumbles followed them, distant roars from other streets, and often she had the feeling of eyes watching from one of the vacant, glassless windows. But word must have spread, or else the watchers had seen what happened, because they saw no one else living until suddenly two dozen Whitecloaks stepped into the street in front of them, half with drawn bows, the rest with bared blades. The Shienarans’ blades were up in a heartbeat.

Quick words between Galad and a fellow with a grizzled face beneath his conical helmet passed them through, though the man did eye the Shienarans doubtfully, and Thom and Juilin, and for that matter Birgitte. It was enough to rankle Nynaeve. All very well for Elayne to march along with her chin raised, ignoring the Whitecloaks as though they were servants, but Nynaeve did not like being taken for granted.

The river was not far. Beyond a few small stone warehouses under slate roofs, the town’s three stone docks barely reached water over the dried mud. A fat vessel with two masts sat low at the end of one. Nynaeve hoped there would be no problem obtaining separate cabins. She hoped it would not heave too badly.

A small crowd huddled twenty paces from the dock, under the watchful eyes of four white-cloaked guards; nearly a dozen men, mainly old and all ragged and bruised, and twice as many women, most with two or three children clinging to them, some with a babe in arms beside. Two more Whitecloaks stood right at the dock. The children hid their faces in their mothers’ skirts, but the adults gazed yearningly at the ship. The sight wrenched at Nynaeve’s heart; she remembered the same gazes, many more of them, in Tanchico. People desperately hoping for a way to safety. She had not been able to do anything for those.

Before she could do anything for these, Galad had seized her and Elayne by the arm and hustled them along the dock and down an unsteady gangplank. Six more stern-faced men in white cloaks and burnished mail stood on the deck, watching a cluster of barefoot and mostly bare-chested men squatting in the bluff bows. It was close whether the captain at the foot of the plank gazed at the Whitecloaks more sourly or at the motley party that trooped onto his ship.

Agni Neres was a tall, bony man in a dark coat, with ears that stood out and a dour cast to his narrow face. He paid no mind to the sweat rolling down his cheeks. “You paid me passage for two women. I suppose you want me to take the other wench and the men for free?” Birgitte eyed him dangerously, but he seemed not to see.

“You shall have your fare money, my good captain,” Elayne told him coolly.

“As long as it’s reasonable,” Nynaeve said, and ignored Elayne’s sharp glance.

Neres’ mouth thinned, though it hardly seemed possible, and he addressed Galad again. “Then if you’ll get your men off my craft, I’ll sail. I like being here in daylight now less than ever.”

“As soon as you take your other passengers on,” Nynaeve said, nodding to the people huddled ashore.

&n

bsp; Neres looked for Galad only to find that he had moved away to speak with the other Whitecloaks, then eyed the folk ashore and spoke to the air above Nynaeve’s head. “Any who can pay. Not many in that lot look like they can. And I could not take the lot if they could.”

She raised herself on tiptoe, so he could not possibly miss her smile. It snapped his chin down into his collar. “Every last one of them, Captain. Else I’ll shave your ears off for you.”

The man’s mouth opened angrily; then abruptly his eyes widened, staring past her. “All right,” he said quickly. “But I expect some sort of payment, mind. I give alms on Firstday, and that’s long past.”

Heels settling back to the deck, she looked over her shoulder suspiciously. Thom, Juilin and Uno stood there, blandly watching her and Neres. As blandly as they could manage with Uno’s features, and blood all over their faces. Far too blandly.

With a sharp sniff, she said, “I will see them all aboard before anybody touches a rope,” and went in search of Galad. She supposed he deserved some thanks. He had thought what he was doing was the right thing. That was the trouble with the best of men. They always thought they were doing the right thing. Still, whatever the three had done, they had saved argument.

She found him with Elayne, that handsome face painted with frustration. He brightened at the sight of her. “Nynaeve, I’ve paid your way as far as Boannda. That’s only halfway to Altara, where the Boern runs into the Eldar, but I could not afford to pay further. Captain Neres took every copper in my purse, and I had to borrow besides. The fellow charges ten prices. I’m afraid you will have to make your own way to Caemlyn from there. I truly am sorry.”

“You have done quite enough already,” Elayne put in, her eyes drifting toward the plumes of smoke rising above Samara.

“I gave my promise,” he said with a weary resignation. Plainly they had had the same exchange before Nynaeve came.

Nynaeve managed to offer her thanks, which he dismissed graciously, but with a look as if she, too, did not understand. And she was more than ready to admit as much. He started a war to keep a promise—Elayne was right about that; it would be a war, if it was not already—yet, with his men holding Neres’ ship, he would not demand a better price. It was Neres’ ship, and Neres could charge as he chose. As long as he took Elayne and Nynaeve. It was true: Galad never counted the cost of doing right, not to himself or anyone else.

Tags: Robert Jordan The Wheel of Time Fantasy
Source: readsnovelonline.net