A Crown of Swords (The Wheel of Time 7)

“They are Aes Sedai.” Dark eyes met Perrin’s golden stare levelly. “They cannot be trusted, and they cannot be turned loose. How long can Aes Sedai be held against their will? They’ve been doing what they do far longer than the Asha’man. They must know more. They’re a danger to the Lord Dragon, and to you, Lord Perrin. I have seen them look at you.”

Across the wagon circle, the sisters were talking among themselves in whispers even Perrin could not hear, mouths held close to ears. Now and again one did look at him and Aram. At him, not Aram. He had caught a double handful of names. Nesune Bihara. Erian Boroleos and Katerine Alruddin. Coiren Saeldain, Sarene Nemdahl and Elza Penfell. Janine Pavlara, Beldeine Nyram, Marith Riven. Those last were the young sisters, but young or ageless, they watched him with faces so serene it seemed they had the upper hand despite the Asha’man. Defeating Aes Sedai was not easy; making them admit defeat lay on the far side of impossible.

He forced his hands to unknot and rest on his knees, giving an appearance of calm he was nowhere near feeling. They knew he was ta’veren, one of those few the Pattern would shape itself around for a time. Worse, they knew he was tied to Rand in some way nobody understood, least of all himself or Rand. Or Mat; Mat was in that tangle, too, another ta’veren, though neither of them as strongly as Rand. Given half a chance those women would have him — and Mat — inside the White Tower as fast as they would Rand, tethered like goats until the lion came. And they had kidnapped Rand, mistreated him. Aram was right about one thing; they could not be trusted. But what Aram suggested — he would not — could not! — countenance such a thing. The thought made him queasy.

“I’ll hear no more of that,” he growled. The onetime Tinker opened his mouth, but Perrin cut him off. “Not a word, Aram, do you hear me? Not one word!”

“As my Lord Perrin commands,” Aram murmured, inclining his head.

Perrin wished he could see the man’s face. There was no anger in the smell of him, no resentment. That was the worst of it. There had been no anger scent even when Aram suggested murder.

A pair of Two Rivers men climbed up on the wheels of the next wagon, peering across the wagon bed and down the hill toward the north. Each wore a bristling quiver on his right hip and a stout, long-bladed knife, almost a short-sword, on his left. A good three hundred men from home had followed Perrin here. He cursed the first to call him Lord Perrin, cursed the day he had stopped trying to quash it. Even with the murmurs and noises usual in a camp this size, he had no trouble hearing the pair.

Tod al’Caar, a year younger than Perrin, let out a long breath, as if seeing what lay below for the first time. Perrin could almost sense the lanky man’s lantern jaw working. Tod’s mother had willingly let him go only for the honor of her son following Perrin Goldeneyes. “A famous victory,” Tod said finally. “That’s what we won. Wasn’t it, Jondyn?”

Grizzled Jondyn Barran, gnarled as an oak root, was one of the few older men among the three hundred. A better bowshot than anyone in the Two Rivers except Master al’Thor and a better hunter than anyone at all, he was one of the Two Rivers’ less distinguished residents. Jondyn had not worked a day more than he had to since he was old enough to leave his father’s farm. The forests and the hunt were all he cared about, that and drinking too much at feastdays. Now he spat loudly. “If you say so, boy. Was those bloody Asha’man won it, anyway. And welcome to it, I say. Too bad they don’t take it and go someplace else to celebrate.”

“They aren’t so bad,” Tod protested. “I wouldn’t mind being one myself.” That sounded more boast and bluff than truth. Smelled it, too; without looking, Perrin was sure he was licking his lips. Likely Tod’s mother had used tales of men who could channel to frighten him not so many years ago. “I mean to say, Rand — that is, the Lord Dragon — it still sounds odd, doesn’t it, Rand al’Thor being the Dragon Reborn and all?” Tod laughed, a short, uneasy sound. “Well, he can channel, and it doesn’t seem so — he doesn’t — I mean . . . ” He swallowed loudly. “Besides, what could we have done about all those Aes Sedai without them?” That came out in a whisper. He smelled afraid now. “Jondyn, what are we going to do? I mean, Aes Sedai prisoners?”

The older man spat again, louder than before. He did not bother to lower his voice, either. Jondyn always said what he thought no matter who heard, another reason for his ba

d repute. “Better for us if they’d all died yesterday, boy. We’ll pay for that before it’s done. Mark me, we’ll pay large.”

Perrin shut out the rest, no easy task with his ears. First Aram, and now Jondyn and Tod, if not so directly. Burn Jondyn! No, the man might make Mat look industrious, but if he spoke it, others thought it. No Two Rivers man would willingly harm a woman, but who else wished the Aes Sedai prisoners dead? And who might try to achieve the wish?

He scanned the wagon circle uneasily. The thought that he might have to protect the Aes Sedai prisoners was not pleasant, but he did not shirk it. He had little fondness for any Aes Sedai, least of all for these, but he had grown up in the unspoken certainty that a man would put himself at risk to protect a woman as far she allowed; whether he liked her or even knew her was beside the point. True, an Aes Sedai could tie any man she chose into a knot nine ways from next feastday, but cut off from the Power, they became like anyone else. That was the struggle whenever he looked at them. Two dozen Aes Sedai. Two dozen women who might not know how to defend themselves without the Power.

For a bit he studied the Asha’man guards, every one wearing a face like grim death. Except the three overseeing the stilled women. They tried to appear as somber as the rest, but under the attempt lay something else. Satisfaction, maybe. If only he was close enough to catch a scent of them. Any Aes Sedai was a threat to the Asha’man. Perhaps the reverse was true, too. Perhaps they would only still them. From the little he had picked up, stilling an Aes Sedai amounted to a killing that just took a few years for the corpse to lie down.

Whatever the case, he decided reluctantly, he had to leave the Asha’man to Rand. They spoke only to each other and the prisoners, and Perrin doubted they would listen to anyone but Rand. The question was, what would Rand say? And what could Perrin do if he said the wrong thing?

Putting that problem aside, he scratched his beard with one finger. The Cairhienin were too nervous about Aes Sedai to consider harming them, and the Mayeners too respectful, but he would keep an eye on them anyway. Who would have thought Jondyn would go as far as he had? Among the Cairhienin or Mayeners, he possessed some influence, though it would surely vanish if they once thought. He was really just a blacksmith, after all. That left the Aiel. Perrin sighed. He was not certain how much influence even Rand truly had with the Aiel.

It was difficult picking out individual scents with so many people around, but he had grown used to telling as much by smells as by what his eyes told him. The siswai’aman who came close enough smelled calm but alert, a smooth, strong scent. They hardly appeared to notice the Aes Sedai. The Maidens’ aromas were spiky with suppressed fury and grew spikier when they looked at the prisoners. And the Wise Ones . . .

Every Wise One who had come here from Cairhien was able to channel, though none had the ageless face. He supposed they used the One Power too seldom. Still, smooth-cheeked like Edarra or as leathery-faced as white-haired Sorilea, they carried themselves with a self-possession easily matching the Aes Sedai’s. Graceful women for the most part, most of them tall, as nearly all Aiel were, they seemed to ignore the sisters completely.

Sorilea’s eyes passed across the prisoners without pausing, and she went right on talking softly to Edarra and another Wise One, a lean, yellow-haired woman he did not know by name. If only he could make out what they were saying. They walked by, not a line changing on those three unruffled faces, but their scents were another matter. When Sorilea’s gaze swept over the Aes Sedai, the smell of her went cold and distant, grim and purposeful, and as she spoke to the other two, their scents changed to match hers.

“A fine bloody stew,” he growled.

“Trouble?” Aram asked, sitting up straighter on his heels, right hand poised to dart for the wolfhead-pommeled sword hilt jutting above his shoulder. He had become very good with that sword in a very short time, and he was never loath to use it.

“There’s no trouble, Aram.” That was not quite a lie. Jolted out of his glum brooding, Perrin really looked at the others for the first time. At all of them together. He did not like what he saw, and the Aes Sedai were only part.

Cairhienin and Mayeners watched Aiel suspiciously, which was no more than the Aiel’s return suspicion, especially toward the Cairhienin. No real surprise there. Aiel did have a certain reputation, after all, for being none too friendly to anyone born this side of the Spine of the World, Cairhienin least of all. Simple truth was, Aiel and Cairhienin hated each other about as hard as it was possible to hate. Neither side had really put their enmity aside — the best that could be said was that it was on a loose leash — yet up to now he had been convinced they would hold it in. For Rand’s sake if no other reason. A mood hung in the camp, though, a tension that had wound everyone tight. Rand was free now, and temporary alliances were just that, after all; temporary. Aiel hefted their spears when they looked at the Cairhienin, and the Cairhienin grimly fingered their swords. So did the Mayeners; they had no quarrel with the Aiel, had never fought them except for the Aiel War when everybody had, but if it came to a fight, there was little doubt which side they would be on. The Two Rivers men, too, probably.

The dark mood had settled deepest into the Asha’man and the Wise Ones, though. The black-coated men paid no more heed to the Maidens and the siswai’aman than to Cairhienin or Mayeners or Two Rivers men, but they studied the Wise Ones with faces almost as dark as those they directed at the Aes Sedai. Very likely they made small distinction between one woman who could wield the Power and another. Any could be an enemy and dangerous; thirteen together were deadly dangerous, and there were better than ninety Wise Ones in the camp or nearby. Fewer than half the number of Asha’man, but still enough to do damage if they chose. Women who could channel, yet they seemed to follow Rand; they seemed to follow Rand, yet they were women who could channel.

The Wise Ones looked at the Asha’man only a trifle less coldly than they did the Aes Sedai. The Asha’man were men who could channel, but they followed Rand; they followed Rand, but . . . Rand was a special case. According to Gaul, his channeling was not mentioned in the prophecies about their Car’a’carn, but the Aiel seemed to pretend that inconvenient fact did not exist. The Asha’man were not in those prophecies at all, though. It must be like discovering you had a pride of rabid lions fighting on your side. How long would they remain loyal? Maybe it would be better to put them down now.

His head fell back against the wagon wheel, eyes closed, and his chest heaved in silent, mirthless laughter. Think of the good things on High Chasaline. Burn me, he thought wryly, I should have gone with Rand. No, it was best to know, and better soon than late. But what in the Light was he to do? If the Aiel and the Cairhienin and Mayeners turned on one another, or worse, the Asha’man and the Wise Ones . . . A barrel full of snakes, and the only way to find out which were vipers was to stick your hand in. Light, I wish I was home, with Faile, and a forge to work, and nobody calling me bloody lord.

“Your horse, Lord Perrin. You didn’t say whether you wanted Stepper or Stayer, so I saddled — ”At Perrin’s golden-eyed glare, Kenly Maerin shied back into the dun stallion he was leading.

Perrin made a soothing gesture. Not Kenly’s fault. What could not be mended had to be endured. “Easy, lad. You did right. Stepper will do just fine. You chose well.” He hated speaking to Kenly that way. Short and stocky, Kenly was barely old enough to marry or leave home — and certainly not old enough for the patchy beard he was trying to cultivate in imitation of Perrin — yet he had fought Trollocs at Emond’s Field and done well yesterday. But he grinned broadly at praise from Lord Perrin bloody Goldeneyes.

Rising, Perrin took his axe from where he had propped it under the wagon, out of sight and for a little while out of mind, and thrust the haft through the loop on his belt. A heavy half-moon blade balanced by a thick curving spike; a thing made for no other purpose than killing. The axe haft felt too familiar to his hands for comfort. Did he even remember what a good forge-hammer felt like? There were other things besides “Lord Perrin” that it might be too late to change. A friend had once told him to keep the axe until he began to like using it. The thought made him shiver in spite of the heat.