Watching the three from the edge of her eye, she moved as close to the iron latticework as she could and gripped it with both hands to steady herself. Light, she was tired! "I saw Beonin today," she said softly. "She's here in the Tower. She claimed her oath to me no longer held because I was no longer the Amyrlin Seat."
Leane gasped and stepped near enough that she was brushing the iron bars. "She betrayed us?"
"The inherent impossibility of dissimulated structures is a given," Nagora said firmly. Her voice was an icy hammer. "A given."
"She denies it, and I believe her," Egwene whispered. "But she admitted betraying the ferrets. Elaida is only having them watched for the moment, but I told Beonin to warn them, and she said she would. She said she had already warned Meidani and Jennet, but why would she betray them and then tell them about it? And she said she would like to see Elaida pulled down. Why would she flee to Elaida if she still wants her brought down? She as much as admitted no one else has abandoned our cause. I'm missing something, and I'm too tired to see what it is." A yawn that she barely managed to cover with a hand cracked her jaw.
"Dissimulated structures are implied by four of the five axioms of sixth-order rationality," Miyasi said just as firmly. "Strongly implied."
"So-called sixth-order rationality has been discarded as an aberration by anyone with intellect," Norine put in, a touch sharply. "But dissimulated structures are fundamental to any possibility of understanding what is happening right here in the Tower every day. Reality itself is shifting, changing day by day.”
Leane glanced at the Whites. "Some always thought Elaida had spies among us. If Beonin was one, her oath to you would have held her until she could convince herself you were no longer Amyrlin. But if her reception here wasn't what she expected, it might have changed her loyalties. Beonin was always ambitious. If she didn't get her due as she sees matters. . . ." She spread her hands. "Beonin always expected her due and perhaps a little more."
"Logic is always applicable to the real world," Miyasi said dismissively, "but only a novice would think the real world can be applied to logic. Ideals must be first principles. Not the mundane world." Nagora snapped her mouth shut with a dark look, as if she felt words had been snatched right off her tongue.
Coloring faintly, Norine rose and glided away from the benches toward Egwene. The other two followed her with their eyes, and she seemed to feel their gazes, shifting her shawl uncomfortably first one way than another. "Child, you look exhausted. Go to your bed now."
Egwene wanted nothing more than her bed, but she had a question to be answered first. Only she had to be careful. The three Whites were all paying attention now. "Leane, do the sisters who visit you still ask the same questions?"
"I told you to go to your bed," Norine said sharply. She clapped her hands together as if that would somehow make Egwene obey.
"Yes," Leane said. "I see what you mean. Perhaps there can be a measure of trust."
"A small measure," Egwene said.
Norine planted her fists on her hips. There was little coolness in her face or her voice, and no vagueness at all about her. "Since you refuse to go to your bed, you can go to the Mistress of Novices and tell her you disobeyed a sister."
"Of course," Egwene said quickly, turning to go. She had her answer—Beonin had not passed on Traveling, and that meant she likely had not passed on anything else; perhaps there could be a little trust—and besides. Nagora and Miyasi were advancing on her. The last thing she wanted was to be dragged bodily to Silviana's study, something Miyasi at least was quite capable of. She had even stronger arms than Ferane.
On the morning of her ninth day back in the Tower, before first light, Doesine herself came to Egwene's small room to give her her morning dose of Healing. Outside, rain was falling with a dull roar. The two Reds who had been watching over her sleep gave her her forkroot, frowning at Doesine, and hurried away. The Yellow Sitter snorted in contempt when the door closed behind them. She used the old method of Healing that made Egwene gasp as though doused in an icy pond and left her ravenously eager for breakfast. As well as free of the pain in her bottom. That actually felt peculiar; you could adapt to anything over time, and a bruised bottom already seemed normal. But the use of the old way, the way used every time she had been given Healing since being captured, reaffirmed that Beonin had kept some secrets, though how she had managed it was still a mystery. Beonin herself had only said that most sisters thought the tales of new weaves were merely rumors.
"You don't mean to bloody surrender, do you, child?" Doesine said while Egwene was pulling her dress over her head. The woman's language was very much at odds with her elegant appearance, in gold-embroidered blue with sapphires at her ears and in her hair.
"Should the Amyrlin Seat ever surrender?" Egwene asked as her head popped out at the top of her dress. She doubled her arms behind her to do up the buttons of white-dyed horn.
Doesine snorted again, though not in contempt, Egwene thought. "A brave course, child. Still, my wager is that Silviana will bloody well have you sitting straight and walking right before much longer." But she left without calling Egwene down for naming herself the Amyrlin Seat.
Egwene had yet another appointment with the Mistress of Novices before breakfast—she had not missed a day, so far—and following a determined effort to undo Doesine's work in one go, her tears ceased as soon as Silviana's strap stopped falling. When she lifted herself off the end of the writing table, where a leather pad was attached just for bending over, its surface worn down by who knew how many women, and her skirt and shift fell against her fiery skin, she felt no urge to flinch. She accepted the painful heat, welcomed it, warmed herself with it as she would have warmed her hands in front of a fireplace on a cold winter morning. There seemed a strong resemblance between her bottom and a blazing fireplace right at that moment. Yet looking into the mirror, she saw an unruffled face. Red-cheeked, but calm.
"How could Shemerin have been reduced to Accepted?'' she asked, wiping her tears away with her handkerchief. "I've inquired, and there's no provision for it in Tower law."
"How often have you been sent to me because of those 'inquiries'?" Silviana asked, hanging the split-tailed strap in the narrow cabinet alongside the leather paddle and the limber switch. "I'd think you would have given over long since."
"I'm curious. How, when there's no provision?"
"No provision, child," Silviana said gently, as if explaining to a child in truth, "but no prohibition, either. A loophole that. . . . Well, we won't go into that. You'd only find a way to get yourself another strapping with it." Shaking her head, she took her seat behind the writing table and rested her hands on the tabletop. "The problem was that Shemerin accepted it. Other sisters told her to ignore the edict, but once she realized pleading wouldn't change the Amyrlin's mind, she moved into the Accepted's quarters."
Egwene's stomach growled loudly, anxious for breakfast, but she was not done. She was actually having a conversation with Silviana. A conversation, however odd the topic. "But why would she run away? Surely her friends didn't stop trying to talk sense into her."
"Some talked sense," Silviana said dryly. "Others. ..." She moved her hands like the pans of a balance scale, first one up then the other. "Others tried to force her to see sense. They sent her to me nearly as often as you are sent. I treated her visits as private penances, but she lacked your—" She stopped abruptly, leaning back in her chair and studying Egwene over steepled fingers. "Well, now. You actually have me chatting. Not prohibited certainly, yet hardly proper in these circumstances. Go on to breakfast," she said, picking up her pen and opening the silver cap of her ink jar. "I'll mark you down for midday again, since I know you have no intention of curtsying." The faintest hint of resignation tinged her voice.
When Egwene entered the novices' dining hall, the first novice to see her stood, and suddenly there was a loud scraping of benches on the colorful floor tiles as the others rose, too. They stood there at their benches in
silence as Egwene walked down the center aisle toward the kitchen. Suddenly Ashelin, a plump, pretty girl from Altara, darted into the kitchen. Before Egwene reached the kitchen door. Ashelin was back with a tray in her hands that held the usual thick cup of steaming tea and plate of bread, olives and cheese. Egwene reached for the tray, but the olive-skinned girl hurried to the nearest table and set it down in front of an empty bench, offering a suggestion of a curtsy as she backed away. Lucky for her, neither of Egwene's escorts this morning had chosen that moment to peer into the dining hall. Lucky for all those novices on their feet.
A cushion rested on the bench in front of Egwene's tray. A tattered thing that was more patches in different colors than original material, but still a cushion. Egwene picked it up and set it on the end of the table before sitting down. Welcoming the pain was easy. She basked in the warmth of her own fires. A soft susurration gusted through the room, a collective sigh. Only when she popped an olive into her mouth did the novices sit.
She almost spat it out again—it was not far short of spoiled—but she was famished after her Healing, so she spat only the pit into the palm of her hand and deposited it on the plate, washing the taste away with a sip of tea. There was honey in the tea! Novices got honey only on special occasions. She tried not to smile as she cleaned her plate, and clean it she did, even picking up crumbs of bread and cheese with a dampened finger. Not smiling was difficult, though. First Doesine—a Sitter!—then Silviana's resignation, now this. The two sisters were far more important than the novices or the honey, but they all indicated the same thing. She was winning her war.
CHAPTER 25 Attending Elaida
Gold-embossed leather folder under her arm, Tarna kept to the central core of the Tower as she climbed toward Elaida's apartments, although it meant using a seemingly endless series of staircases—twice those stairs were not located where she remembered them, but so long as she continued upward, she would reach her destination—rather than the gently spiraling corridors. On the stairs, she met no one but occasional liveried servants who bowed or curtsied before hurrying on about their tasks. In either of the spiraling hallways she would have to pass the entrances to the Ajah quarters and perhaps encounter other sisters. Her Keeper's stole allowed her to enter any Ajah's quarters, yet she avoided all except the Red save when duty called. Among sisters of the other Ajahs she was all too aware that her narrow stole was red, all too aware of hot eyes watching her from cold faces. They did not unnerve her—little did; she took the shifting interior of the Tower in stride—but still. . . . She thought matters had not gone so far that anyone would actually attack the Keeper, yet she took no chances. Retrieving the situation was going to be a long, hard struggle, whatever Elaida thought, and an assault on the Keeper might make it irretrievable.
Besides, not having to watch over her shoulder allowed her to think on Pevara's troubling question, one she had not considered before suggesting the bonding of Asha'man. Who in the Red actually could be trusted with the task? Hunting men who could channel led Red sisters to look askance at all men, and a fair number hated them. A surviving brother or father might well escape hatred, a favorite cousin or uncle, but once they were all gone, so was affection. And trust. And there was another matter of trust. Bonding any man violated custom strong as law. Even with Tsutama's blessings, who might run to Elaida when bonding Asha'man was broached? She had removed three more names from her mental list of possibilities by the time she reached the entrance to Elaida's apartments, only two floors below the top of the Tower. After almost two weeks, her list of those she could be certain of still contained only a single name, and that one was impossible for the task.
Elaida was in her sitting room, where the furnishings were all gilt and ivory inlays and the large patterned carpet was one of Tear's finest creations. She was sitting in a low-backed chair before the marble fireplace sipping wine with Meidani. Seeing the Gray was no surprise despite the early hour. Meidani dined with the Amyrlin most nights, and visited often during the day by invitation. Elaida, her six-striped stole wide enough to cover her shoulders, was regarding the taller woman over her crystal goblet, a dark-eyed eagle regarding a mouse with big blue eyes. Meidani, emeralds at her ears and on a wide collar around her slim throat, seemed very conscious of that gaze. Her full lips smiled, but they seemed tremulous. The hand not holding her goblet moved constantly, touching the emerald comb over her left ear, patting her hair, covering her bosom, which was largely exposed by her snug bodice of brocaded silvery-gray silk. Her bosom was hardly excessive, yet her slenderness made it seem so, and she appeared about to pop free of the garment. The woman was garbed for a ball. Or a seduction.
"The morning reports are ready, Mother," Tarna said, bowing slightly. Light! She felt as if she had intruded on lovers!
"You won't mind leaving us, Meidani?" Even the smile Elaida directed at the yellow-haired woman was predatory.
"Of course not, Mother." Meidani set her goblet on the small table beside her chair and leaped to her feet, offering a curtsy that nearly had her out of her dress. "Of course not." She scurried from the room breathing hard, her eyes wide.
When the door closed behind her, Elaida laughed. "We were pillow-friends as novices," she said, rising, "and I believe she wants to renew the relationship. I may let her. She might reveal more on the pillows than she's let slip so far. Which is nothing, truth to tell." She strode to the nearest window and stood staring down toward where her fantastical palace would rise to overtop the Tower itself. Eventually. If sisters could be convinced to work on it again. The heavy rain that had begun during the night was still falling, and it seemed unlikely she could see anything of that palace's foundations, all that had been completed so far. "Help yourself to wine if you wish."
Tarna kept her face smooth with an effort. Pillow-friends were common among novices and Accepted, but girlhood things should be left behind with girlhood. Not all sisters saw it so, certainly. Galina had been quite surprised when Tarna refused her advances after gaining the shawl. She herself found men far more attractive than women. Most seemed heavily intimidated by Aes Sedai, to be sure, especially if they learned you were Red Ajah, but over the years she had come across a few who were not.
"That seems odd, Mother," she said, putting the leather folder down on the side table that held an ornately wrought golden tray bearing a crystal wine pitcher and goblets. "She appears frightened of you." Filling a goblet, she sniffed the wine before sipping. The Keepings seemed to be working. For now. Elaida had finally agreed that that weave, at least, must be shared. "Almost as if she knew that you know about her being a spy."
"Of course she's afraid of me." Sarcasm dripped heavily from Elaida's voice, but then hardened to stone. "I want her afraid. I intend to put her through the mangle. By the time I have her birched, she'll tie herself to the birching frame if I order it. If she knew I knew, Tarna, she'd be fleeing instead of delivering herself into my hands." Still staring out into the rainstorm, Elaida sipped at her wine. "Have you any news of the others?"
"No, Mother. If I could inform the Sitters of why they're to be watched—"
"No!" Elaida snapped, spinning to face her. Her dress was such a mass of intricate red scrollwork that the embroidery all but hid the gray silk beneath. Tarna had suggested that less flaunting of her former Ajah—she had phrased it more diplomatically, but that was what she meant—might help bring the Ajahs together again, yet Elaida's eruption of fury had been sufficient to keep her quiet on the topic since. "What if some of the Sitters are working with them? I wouldn't put it past them. Those ridiculous talks continue at the bridge despite my orders. No, I wouldn't put it past them at all!"
Tarna inclined her head over her goblet, accepting what she could not change. Elaida refused to see that if the Ajahs disobeyed her order to break off the talks, they were unlikely to spy on their own sisters at her command without knowing why. Saying so would only result in another tirade, though.
Elaida stared at her as if to make sure she w
as not going to argue. The woman seemed harder than ever. And more brittle. "A pity the rebellion in Tarabon failed," she said at last. "There's nothing to be done about it, I suppose." But she mentioned it frequently, at odd moments, since word came that the Seanchan were reasserting their grip on that country. She was not so resigned as she pretended. "I want to hear some good news, Tarna. Is there any word of the seals on the Dark One's prison? We must make sure no more get broken." As if Tarna did not know that!
"Not that the Ajahs have reported, Mother, and I don't think they would hold that back." She wished she had those last words back as soon as they were spoken.
Elaida grunted. The Ajahs released only trickles of what their eyes-and-ears told them, and she resented that bitterly. Her own eyes-and-ears were concentrated in Andor. "How is the work coming at the harbors?"
"Slowly, Mother." With the flow of trade stifled, the city was already feeling hunger. It would begin starving soon, unless the harbor mouths were cleared. Even cutting away the portion of the Southharbor chain that was still iron had proved not enough to allow sufficient ships in to feed Tar Valon. Once Tarna was able to convince her of the necessity, Elaida had ordered the chain towers dismantled so those huge pieces of cuendillar could be removed. Like the city walls, however, the towers had been built and strengthened with the Power, and only the Power could disassemble them. It was far from easy. The original builders had done good work, and those wards seemed not to have weakened a hair. "Reds are doing most of the work for the time being. Sisters from other Ajahs come now and then, but only a few. I expect that will change soon, though." They knew the necessity of the work, however much they might resent it—no sister could like having to labor in that fashion: the Reds doing most of it certainly grumbled enough—but the order had come from Elaida, and these days, that resulted in foot-dragging.