The Wheel of Time, page 75
“I will fetch your horse,” he told Nynaeve as he finished with the last saddle tie.
He started up the riverbank, and she allowed herself a small smile. After the way she had watched him undiscovered, he was going to try to find her horse unaided. He would learn that she left little in the way of tracks when she was stalking. It would be a pleasure when he came back empty-handed.
“Why south?” she asked Moiraine. “I heard you say one of the boys is across the river. And how do you know?”
“I gave each of the boys a token. It created a bond of sorts between them and me. So long as they are alive and have those coins in their possession, I will be able to find them.” Nynaeve’s eyes turned in the direction the Warder had gone, and Moiraine shook her head. “Not like that. It only allows me to discover if they still live, and find them should we become separated. Prudent, do you not think, under the circumstances?”
“I don’t like anything that connects you with anyone from Emond’s Field,” Nynaeve said stubbornly. “But if it will help us find them. . . .”
“It will. I would gather the young man across the river first, if I could.” For a moment frustration tinged the Aes Sedai’s voice. “He is only a few miles from us. But I cannot afford to take the time. He should make his way down to Whitebridge safely now that the Trollocs have gone. The two who went downriver may need me more. They have lost their coins, and Myrddraal are either pursuing them or else trying to intercept us all at Whitebridge.” She sighed. “I must take care of the greatest need first.”
“The Myrddraal could have . . . could have killed them,” Nynaeve said.
Moiraine shook her head slightly, denying the suggestion as if it were too trivial to be considered. Nynaeve’s mouth tightened. “Where is Egwene, then? You haven’t even mentioned her.”
“I do not know,” Moiraine admitted, “but I hope that she is safe.”
“You don’t know? You hope? All that talk about saving her life by taking her to Tar Valon, and she could be dead for all you know!”
“I could look for her and allow the Myrddraal more time before I arrive to help the two young men who went south. It is them the Dark One wants, not her. They would not bother with Egwene, so long as their true quarry remains uncaught.”
Nynaeve remembered her own encounter, but she refused to admit the sense of what Moiraine said. “So the best you have to offer is that she may be alive, if she was lucky. Alive, maybe alone, frightened, even hurt, days from the nearest village or help except for us. And you intend to leave her.”
“She may just as easily be safe with the boy across the river. Or on her way to Whitebridge with the other two. In any case, there are no longer Trollocs here to threaten her, and she is strong, intelligent, and quite capable of finding her way to Whitebridge alone, if need be. Would you rather stay on the chance that she may need help, or do you want to try to help those we know are in need? Would you have me search for her and let the boys—and the Myrddraal who are surely pursuing them—go? As much as I hope for Egwene’s safety, Nynaeve, I fight against the Dark One, and for now that sets my path.”
Moiraine’s calm never slipped while she laid out the horrible alternatives; Nynaeve wanted to scream at her. Blinking back tears, she turned her face so the Aes Sedai could not see. Light, a Wisdom is supposed to look after all of her people. Why do I have to choose like this?
“Here is Lan,” Moiraine said, rising and settling her cloak about her shoulders.
To Nynaeve it was only a tiny blow as the Warder led her horse out of the trees. Still, her lips thinned when he handed her the reins. It would have been a small boost to her spirits if there had been even a trace of gloating on his face instead of that insufferable stony calm. His eyes widened when he saw her face, and she turned her back on him to wipe tears from her cheeks. How dare he mock my crying!
“Are you coming, Wisdom?” Moiraine asked coolly.
She took one last, slow look at the forest, wondering if Egwene was out there, before sadly mounting her horse. Lan and Moiraine were already in their saddles, turning their horses south. She followed, stiff-backed, refusing to let herself look back; instead she kept her eyes on Moiraine. The Aes Sedai was so confident in her power and her plans, she thought, but if they did not find Egwene and the boys, all of them, alive and unharmed, not all of her power would protect her. Not all her Power. I can use it, woman! You told me so yourself. I can use it against you!
CHAPTER
22
A Path Chosen
In a small copse of trees, beneath a pile of cedar branches roughly cut in the dark, Perrin slept long after sunrise. It was the cedar needles, pricking him through his still-damp clothes, that finally pricked through his exhaustion as well. Deep in a dream of Emond’s Field, of working at Master Luhhan’s forge, he opened his eyes and stared, uncomprehending, at the sweet-smelling branches interwoven over his face, sunlight trickling through.
Most of the branches fell away as he sat up in surprise, but some hung haphazardly from his shoulders, and even his head, making him appear something like a tree himself. Emond’s Field faded as memory rushed back, so vivid that for a moment the night before seemed more real than anything around him now.
Panting, frantic, he scrabbled his axe out of the pile. He clutched it in both hands and peered around cautiously, holding his breath. Nothing moved. The morning was cold and still. If there were Trollocs on the east bank of the Arinelle, they were not moving, at least not close to him. Taking a deep, calming breath, he lowered the axe to his knees, and waited a moment for his heart to stop pounding.
The small stand of evergreens surrounding him was the first shelter he had found last night. It was sparse enough to give little protection against watching eyes if he stood up. Plucking branches from his head and shoulders, he pushed aside the rest of his prickly blanket, then crawled on hands and knees to the edge of the copse. There he lay studying the riverbank and scratching where the needles had stabbed him.
The cutting wind of the night before had faded to a silent breeze that barely rippled the surface of the water. The river ran by, calm and empty. And wide. Surely too wide and too deep for Fades to cross. The far bank appeared a solid mass of trees as far as he could see upriver and down. Certainly nothing moved in his view over there.
He was not sure how he felt about that. Fades and Trollocs he could do without quite easily, even on the other side of the river, but a whole list of worries would have vanished with the appearance of the Aes Sedai, or the Warder, or, even better, any of his friends. If wishes were wings, sheep would fly. That was what Mistress Luhhan always said.
He had not seen a sign of his horse since riding over the bluff—he hoped it had swum out of the river safely—but he was more used to walking than riding anyway, and his boots were stout and well soled. He had nothing to eat, but his sling was still wrapped around his waist, and that or the snarelines in his pocket ought to yield a rabbit in a little time. Everything for making a fire was gone with his saddlebags, but the cedar trees would yield tinder and a firebow with a bit of work.
He shivered as the breeze gusted into his hiding place. His cloak was somewhere in the river, and his coat and everything else he wore were still clammy cold from the soaking in the river. He had been too tired for the cold and damp to bother him last night, but now he was wide awake to every chill. Just the same, he decided against hanging his clothes on the branches to dry. If the day was not precisely cold, it was not even close to warm.
Time was the problem, he thought with a sigh. Dry clothes, with a little time. A rabbit to roast and a fire to roast it over, with a little time. His stomach rumbled, and he tried to forget about eating altogether. There were more important uses for that time. One thing at a time, and the most important first. That was his way.
His eyes followed the strong flow of the Arinelle downriver. He was a stronger swimmer than Egwene. If she had made it across. . . . No, not if. The place where she had made it across would be downriver. He drummed on the ground with his fingers, weighing, considering.
His decision made, he wasted no time in picking up his axe and setting off down the river.
This side of the Arinelle lacked the thick forest of the west bank. Clumps of trees spotted across what would be grassland if spring ever came. Some were big enough to be called thickets, with swathes of evergreens among the barren ash and alder and hardgum. Down by the river the stands were smaller and not so tight. They gave poor cover, but they were all the cover there was.
He dashed from growth to growth in a crouch, throwing himself down when he was among the trees to study the riverbanks, the far side as well as his. The Warder said the river would be a barrier to Fades and Trollocs, but would it? Seeing him might be enough to overcome their reluctance to cross deep water. So he watched carefully from behind the trees and ran from one hiding place to the next, fast and low.
He covered several miles that way, in spurts, until suddenly, halfway to the beckoning shelter of a growth of willows, he grunted and stopped dead, staring at the ground. Patches of bare earth spotted the matted brown of last year’s grass, and in the middle of one of those patches, right under his nose, was a clear hoofprint. A slow smile spread across his face. Some Trollocs had hooves, but he doubted if any wore horseshoes, especially horseshoes with the double crossbar Master Luhhan added for strength.
Forgetting possible eyes on the other side of the river, he cast about for more tracks. The plaited carpet of dead grass did not take impressions well, but his sharp eyes found them anyway. The scanty trail led him straight away from the river to a dense stand of trees, thick with leatherleaf and cedar that made a wall against wind or prying eyes. The spreading branches of a lone hemlock towered in the middle of it all.
Still grinning, he pushed his way through the interwoven branches, not caring how much noise he made. Abruptly he stepped into a little clearing under the hemlock—and stopped. Behind a small fire, Egwene crouched, her face grim, with a thick branch held like a club and her back against Bela’s flank.
“I guess I should have called out,” he said with an abashed shrug.
Tossing her club down, she ran to throw her arms around him. “I thought you had drowned. You’re still wet. Here, sit by the fire and warm yourself. You lost your horse, didn’t you?”
He let her push him to a place by the fire and rubbed his hands over the flames, grateful for the warmth. She produced an oiled paper packet from her saddlebags and gave him some bread and cheese. The package had been so tightly wrapped that even after its dunking the food was dry. Here you were worrying about her, and she’s done better than you did.
“Bela got me across,” Egwene said, patting the shaggy mare. “She headed away from the Trollocs and just towed me along.” She paused. “I haven’t seen anybody else, Perrin.”
He heard the unspoken question. Regretfully eyeing the packet that she was rewrapping, he licked the last crumbs from his fingers before speaking. “I’ve seen no one but you since last night. No Fades or Trollocs, either; there’s that.”
“Rand has to be all right,” Egwene said, quickly adding, “they all do. They have to. They’re probably looking for us right now. They might find us anytime now. Moiraine is an Aes Sedai, after all.”
“I keep being reminded of that,” he said. “Burn me, I wish I could forget.”
“I did not hear you complaining when she stopped the Trollocs from catching us,” Egwene said tartly.
“I just wish we could do without her.” He shrugged uncomfortably under her steady gaze. “I suppose we can’t, though. I’ve been thinking.” Her eyebrows rose, but he was used to surprise whenever he claimed an idea. Even when his ideas were as good as theirs, they always remembered how deliberate he was in thinking of them. “We can wait for Lan and Moiraine to find us.”
“Of course,” she cut in. “Moiraine Sedai said she would find us if we were separated.”
He let her finish, then went on. “Or the Trollocs could find us, first. Moiraine could be dead, too. All of them could be. No, Egwene. I’m sorry, but they could be. I hope they are all safe. I hope they’ll walk up to this fire any minute. But hope is like a piece of string when you’re drowning; it just isn’t enough to get you out by itself.”
Egwene closed her mouth and stared at him with her jaw set. Finally, she said, “You want to go downriver to Whitebridge? If Moiraine Sedai doesn’t find us here, that’s where she will look next.”
“I suppose,” he said slowly, “that Whitebridge is where we should go. But the Fades probably know that, too. That’s where they’ll be looking, and this time we don’t have an Aes Sedai or a Warder to protect us.”
“I suppose you’re going to suggest running off somewhere, the way Mat wanted to? Hiding somewhere the Fades and Trollocs won’t find us? Or Moiraine Sedai, either?”
“Don’t think I haven’t considered it,” he said quietly. “But every time we think we are free, Fades and Trollocs find us again. I don’t know if there is anyplace we could hide from them. I don’t like it much, but we need Moiraine.”
“I don’t understand then, Perrin. Where do we go?”
He blinked in surprise. She was waiting for his answer. Waiting for him to tell her what to do. It had never occurred to him that she would look to him to take the lead. Egwene never liked doing what someone else had planned out, and she never let anybody tell her what to do. Except maybe the Wisdom, and he thought sometimes she balked at that. He smoothed the dirt in front of him with his hand and cleared his throat roughly.
“If this is where we are now, and that is Whitebridge,” he stabbed the ground twice with his finger, “then Caemlyn should be somewhere around here.” He made a third mark, off to the side.
He paused, looking at the three dots in the dirt. His entire plan was based on what he remembered of her father’s old map. Master al’Vere said it was not too accurate, and, anyway, he had never mooned over it as much as Rand and Mat. But Egwene said nothing. When he looked up, she was still watching him with her hands in her lap.
“Caemlyn?” She sounded stunned.
“Caemlyn.” He drew a line in the dirt between two of the dots. “Away from the river, and straight across. Nobody would expect that. We’ll wait for them in Caemlyn.” He dusted his hands and waited. He thought it was a good plan, but surely she would have objections now. He expected she would take charge—she was always bullying him into something—and that was all right with him.
To his surprise, she nodded. “There must be villages. We can ask directions.”
“What worries me,” Perrin said, “is what we do if the Aes Sedai doesn’t find us there. Light, who’d ever have thought I’d worry about something like that? What if she doesn’t come to Caemlyn? Maybe she thinks we’re dead. Maybe she’ll take Rand and Mat straight to Tar Valon.”
“Moiraine Sedai said she could find us,” Egwene said firmly. “If she can find us here, she can find us in Caemlyn, and she will.”
Perrin nodded slowly. “If you say so, but if she doesn’t appear in Caemlyn in a few days, we go on to Tar Valon and put our case before the Amyrlin Seat.” He took a deep breath. Two weeks ago you’d never even seen an Aes Sedai, and now you’re talking about the Amyrlin Seat. Light! “According to Lan, there’s a good road from Caemlyn.” He looked at the oiled paper packet beside Egwene and cleared his throat. “What chance of a little more bread and cheese?”
“This might have to last a long time,” she said, “unless you have better luck with snares than I did last night. At least the fire was easy.” She laughed softly as if she had made a joke, tucking the packet back into her saddlebags.
Apparently there were limits to how much leadership she was willing to accept. His stomach rumbled. “In that case,” he said, standing, “we might as well start now.”
“But you’re still wet,” she protested.
“I’ll walk myself dry,” he said firmly, and began kicking dirt over the fire. If he was the leader, it was time to start leading. The wind from the river was picking up.
CHAPTER
23
Wolfbrother
From the start Perrin knew the journey to Caemlyn was going to be far from comfortable, beginning with Egwene’s insistence that they take turns riding Bela. They did not know how far it was, she said, but it was too far for her to be the only one who rode. Her jaw firmed, and her eyes stared at him unblinking.
“I’m too big to ride Bela,” he said. “I’m used to walking, and I’d rather.”
“And I am not used to walking?” Egwene said sharply.
“That isn’t what I—”
“I’m the only one who’s supposed to get saddlesore, is that it? And when you walk till your feet are ready to fall off, you’ll expect me to look after you.”
“Let it be,” he breathed when she looked like going on. “Anyway, you’ll take the first turn.” Her face turned even more stubborn, but he refused to let her get a word in edgewise. “If you won’t get in the saddle by yourself, I’ll put you there.”
She gave him a startled look, and a small smile curved her lips. “In that case. . . .” She sounded as if she were about to laugh, but she climbed up.
He grumbled to himself as he turned away from the river. Leaders in stories never had to put up with this sort of thing.
Egwene did insist on him taking his turns, and whenever he tried to avoid it, she bullied him into the saddle. Blacksmithing did not lend itself to a slender build, and Bela was not very large as horses went. Every time he put his foot in the stirrup the shaggy mare looked at him with what he was sure was reproach. Small things, perhaps, but they irritated. Soon he flinched whenever Egwene announced, “It’s your turn, Perrin.”
In stories leaders seldom flinched, and they were never bullied. But, he reflected, they never had to deal with Egwene, either.
