Knife of Dreams (The Wheel of Time 11)

"You must be in shock," Nynaeve said slowly. "You've just suffered a grievous injury, Rand. Maybe you'd better lie down. Lord Davram, have one your men bring a saddle to put his feet up."

"He's not in shock,' Min said sadly. The bond was full of sadness. She had taken hold of his arm as if to hold him up again. "He lost a hand, but there's nothing to do about it, so he's left it behind already."

"Wool-headed fool,” Nynaeve muttered. Her hand, still smeared with Sandomere's blood, drifted toward the thick braid hanging over her shoulder, but she yanked it back down. "You've been hurt badly. It's all right to grieve. It's all right to feel stunned. It's normal!"

"I don't have time," he told her. Min's sadness threatened to overflow the bond. Light, he was all right! Why did she feel so sad?

Nynaeve muttered half under her breath about "woolhead" and "fool" and "man-stubborn," but she was not finished. "Those old wounds in your side have broken open," she almost growled. "You aren't bleeding badly, but you are bleeding. Maybe I can finally do something about them."

But as hard as she tried—and she tried three times—nothing changed. He still felt the slow trickle of blood sliding

down his ribs. The wounds were still a throbbing knot of pain. Finally, he pushed her hand gently away from his side. "You've done what you can, Nynaeve. It's enough."

"Fool." She did growl, this time. "How can it be enough when you're still bleeding?"

"Who is the tall woman?" Bashere asked. He understood, at least. You did not waste time on what could not be mended. "They didn't try passing her off as the Daughter of the Nine Moons, did they? Not after telling me she was a little thing."

"They did," Rand replied, and explained briefly.

"Semirhage?" Bashere muttered incredulously. "How can you be sure?"

"She's Anath Dorje, not . . . not what you called her," a honey-skinned sul'dam said loudly in a twangy drawl. Her dark eyes were tilted, and her hair was streaked with gray. She looked the eldest of the sul'dam, and the least frightened. It was not that she did not look afraid, but she controlled it well. "She's the High Lady's Truthspeaker."

"Be silent, Falendre," Semirhage said coldly, looking over her shoulder. Her gaze promised pain. The Lady of Pain was good at delivering on her promises. Prisoners had killed themselves on learning it was she who held them, men and women who managed to open a vein with teeth or fingernails.

Falendre did not seem to see it, though. "You don't command me," she said scornfully. "You're not even so'jhin."

"How can you be sure?" Cadsuane demanded. Those golden moons and stars, birds and fishes, swung as she moved her piercing gaze from Rand to Semirhage and back.

Semirhage saved him the effort of thinking up a lie. "He's insane," she said coolly. Standing there stiff as a statue, Min's knife hilt still sticking out beside her collarbone and the front of her black dress glistening with blood, she might have been a queen on her throne. "Graendal could explain it better than I. Madness was her specialty. I will try, however. You know of people who hear voices in their heads? Sometimes, very rarely, the voices they hear are the voices of past lives. Lanfear claimed he knew things from our own Age, things only Lews Therin Telamon could know. Clearly, he is hearing Lews Therin's voice. It makes no difference that his voice is real, however. In fact, that makes his situation worse. Even Graendal usually failed to achieve reintegration with someone who heard a real voice. I understand the descent into terminal madness can be . . . abrupt." Her lips curved in a smile that never touched her dark eyes.

Were they looking at him differently? Logain's face was a carved mask, unreadable. Bashere looked as though he still could not believe. Nynaeve's mouth hung open, and her eyes were wide. The bond. . . .

For a long moment, the bond was full of. . . numbness. If Min turned away from him, he did not know whether he could stand it. If she turned away, it would be the best thing in the world for her. But compassion and determination as strong as mountains replaced numbness, and love so bright he thought he could have warmed his hands over it. Her grip on his arm tightened, and he tried to put a hand over hers. Too late, he remembered and snatched the nub of his hand away, but not before it had touched her. Nothing in the bond wavered by a hair.

Cadsuane moved closer to the taller woman and looked up at her. Facing one of the Forsaken seemed to faze her no more than facing the Dragon Reborn did. "You're very calm for a prisoner. Rather than deny the charge, you give evidence against yourself."

Semirhage shifted that cold smile from Rand to Cadsuane. "Why should I deny myself?" Pride dripped from every word. "I am Semirhage."

Someone gasped, and a number of the sul'dam and damane started trembling and weeping. One sul'dam, a pretty, yellow-haired woman, suddenly vomited down the front of herself, and another, stocky and dark, looked as if she might.

Cadsuane simply nodded. "I am Cadsuane Melaidhrin. I look forward to long talks with you." Semirhage sneered. She had never lacked courage.

"We thought she was the High Lady," Falendre said hurriedly, and haltingly at the same time. Her teeth seemed near to chattering, but she forced words out. "We thought we were being honored. She took us to a room in the Tarasin Palace where there was a ... a hole in the air, and we stepped through to this place. I swear it on my eyes! We thought she was the High Lady."

"So, no army rushing toward us," Logain said. You could not have told from his tone whether he was relieved or disappointed. He bared an inch of his sword and thrust it back into its scabbard hard. "What do we do with them?" He jerked his head toward the sul'dam and damane. "Send them to Caemlyn like the others?"

"We send them back to Ebou Dar," Rand said. Cadsuane turned to stare at him. Her face was a perfect mask of Aes Sedai serenity, yet he doubted she was anywhere near serene inside. The leashing of damane was an abomination that Aes Sedai took personally. Nynaeve was anything but serene. Angry-eyed, gripping her braid in a tight, blood-daubed fist, she opened her mouth, but he spoke over her. "I need this truce, Nynaeve, and taking these women prisoner is no way to get one. Don't argue. That's what they'd call it, including the damane, and you know it as well as I do. They can carry word that I want to meet the Daughter of the Nine Moons. The heir to the throne is the only one who can make a truce stand."

"I still don't like it,' she said firmly. "We could free the damane. The others will do as well for carrying messages." The damane who had not been weeping before burst into tears. Some of them cried to the sul'dam to save them. Nynaeve's face took on sickly cast, but she threw up her hands and gave over arguing.

The two soldiers Bashere had sent into the house came out, young men who walked with a rolling motion, more accustomed to saddles than their own feet. Hamad had a luxuriant black beard that fell below the edge of his helmet and a scar down his face. Aghan wore thick mustaches like Bashere's and carried a plain wooden box with no lid under his arm. They bowed to Bashere, free hands swinging their swords clear.

"The house is empty, my Lord," Aghan said, "but there's dried blood staining the carpets in several rooms. Looks like a slaughter yard, my Lord. I think whoever lived here is dead. This was sitting by the front door. It didn't look like it belonged, so I brought it along." He held out the box for inspection. Within lay coiled a'dam and a number of circlets made of segmented black metal, some large, some small.

Rand started to reach in with his left hand before he remembered. Min caught the movement and released his right arm so he could scoop up a handful of the black metal pieces. Nynaeve gasped. "You know what these are?" he asked.

"They're a'dam for men," she said angrily. "Egeanin said she was going to drop the thing in the ocean! We trusted her, and she gave it to somebody to copy!"