Winter's Heart (The Wheel of Time #9)

Winter's Heart (The Wheel of Time #9) Page 78

The man . . . rippled. There was no other word for it. He rippled and stretched taller, and suddenly it was Rand, grimacing and swallowing, in rumpled woolens with those awful heads glittering red-and-gold on the backs of his hands and a leather scrip on his shoulder. Where had he learned that? Who had taught him? She resisted the idea of disguising herself, just for a moment, to show him she could do as much.

“I see you didn’t take your own advice,” Rand said to Lan, just as if she were not there. “But why do you let her pretend to be Aes Sedai? Even if the real Aes Sedai let her, she can get hurt.”

“Because she is Aes Sedai, sheepherder,” Lan replied quietly. He did not look at her either! And he still seemed ready to draw his sword in a heartbeat. “As for the other . . . Sometimes, she is stronger than you. Did you take it?”

Rand looked at her then. To frown disbelievingly. Even when she pointedly adjusted her shawl so the yellow fringe swayed. What he said though, shaking his head slowly, was “No. You’re right. Sometimes you’re just too weak to do what you should.”

“What are you two blathering about?” she said sharply.

“Just things that men talk about,” Lan replied.

“You wouldn’t understand,” Rand said.

She sniffed at that. Gossip and idle chatter, that was what men’s talk was, nine times in ten. At best. Wearily, she let go of saidar. Reluctantly. She did not need to protect herself against Rand, certainly, but she would have liked to hold on a little longer, just to touch it, tired or not.

“We know about Cairhien, Rand,” she said, sinking gratefully into a chair. Those cursed Sea Folk had worn her out! “Is that why you’re here, dressed that way? If you’re trying to hide from whoever it was . . .” He looked tired. Harder than she remembered, but very tired. He remained standing, though. Strangely, he seemed much like Lan, ready to draw a sword he was not wearing. Maybe that attempt to kill him would be enough to make him see sense. “Rand, Egwene can help you.”

“I’m not hiding exactly,” he said. “At least, just until I kill some men who need killing.” Light, he was as matter of fact about it as Alivia! Why did he and Lan keep eyeing one another and pretending they were not? “Anyway, how could Egwene help?” he went on, setting the scrip on the table. It made a soft but solid sound of weight inside. “I suppose she’s Aes Sedai, too?” He sounded amused! “Is she here, as well? You three, and two real Aes Sedai. Only two! No. I don’t have time for that. I need you to keep something until — ”

“Egwene is the Amyrlin Seat, you fool woolhead,” she growled. It was nice to be able to interrupt someone else for a change. “Elaida is a usurper. I hope you’ve had sense enough not to go near her! You wouldn’t leave that meeting on your own two legs, I can tell you! There are five real Aes Sedai here, including me, and three hundred more with Egwene and an army, ready to pull Elaida down. Look at yourself! Whatever your brave talk, somebody almost killed you, and you’re sneaking around dressed like a stableman! What safer place for you than with Egwene? Even those Asha’man of yours wouldn’t dare go against three hundred sisters!” Oh, yes; very nice indeed. He tried to mask his surprise, but he made a poor job of it, staring at her.

“You’d be surprised what my Asha’man would dare,” he said dryly after a minute. “I suppose Mat is with Egwene’s army?” Putting a hand to his head, he staggered.

Only half a step, but she was out of her chair before he could right himself. Embracing saidar with an effort, she reached up to clasp his head between her hands, and laboriously wove a Delving around him. She had tried finding a better way to find what ailed someone, so far without success. It was enough. No sooner had the weave settled on him than her breath caught. She had known about the wound in his side from Falme, never healing completely, resisting all the Healing she knew, like a pustule of evil in his flesh. Now there was another half-healed wound atop the old, and that pulsed with evil, too. A different sort of evil, somehow, like a mirror of the other, yet just as virulent. And she could not touch either with the Power. She did not really want to — just thinking of it made her skin crawl! — but she tried. And some thing unseen held her away. Like a ward. A ward she could not see. A ward of saidin?

That made her stop channeling and step back. She clung to the Source; no matter how tired she was, she would have had to force herself to let go. No sister could think of the male half of the Power without at least a touch of fear. He looked down at her calmly, and that made her shiver. He seemed another man entirely from the Rand al’Thor she had watched grow up. She was very glad that Lan was there, hard as that was to admit. Suddenly she realized that he had not relaxed by a whisker. He might chatter with Rand like two men over pipes and ale, but he thought Rand was dangerous. And Rand looked at Lan as if he knew it, and accepted it.

“None of that is important now,” Rand said, turning to the scrip on the table. She did not know whether he meant his wounds or where Mat was. From the scrip he produced two statuettes a foot high, a wise-looking, bearded man and an equally wise and serene woman, each in flowing robes and holding aloft a clear crystal sphere. From the way he handled them, they were heavier than they appeared. “I want you to keep these hidden for me until I send for them, Nynaeve.” One hand on the figure of the woman, he hesitated. “And for you. I’ll need you when I use them. When we use them. After I take care of those men. That has to come first.”

“Use them?” she said suspiciously. Why did killing anyone have to come first? That was hardly the important question, though. “For what? Are they ter’angreal?”

He nodded. “With this, you can touch the greatest sa’angreal ever made for a woman. It’s buried on Tremalking, I understand, but that doesn’t matter.” His hand moved to the figure of the man. “With this one, I can touch its male twin. I was told by . . . someone . . . once, that a man and woman using those sa’angreal could challenge the Dark One. They might have to be used for that, one day, but in the meantime, I hope they’re enough to cleanse the male half of the Source.”

“If it could be done, wouldn’t they have done it in the Age of Legends?” Lan said quietly. Quiet the way steel sliding from a scabbard was quiet. “You said once that I could get her hurt.” It seemed impossible his voice could grow any harder, but it did. “You could kill her, sheepherder.” And his tone made clear tha