Crossroads of Twilight

  “Vandene will be allowed as much time to grieve for her sister as she needs or wants,” Elayne said in level tones. “And there will be no more discussion of it.”

  Careane sighed heavily and rearranged her shawl again. Sarei­tha sighed faintly and began twisting the Great Serpent ring on the forefinger of her left hand. Perhaps they had sensed her mood, or perhaps it was just that neither looked forward to another ses­sion with the Windfinders. Merilille’s permanently surprised expression did not change, but then, her sessions with the Sea Folk lasted all day and all night unless Elayne managed to pry her away, and the Windfinders were becoming less and less willing to let her go no matter how Elayne pried.

  At least she had managed to avoid being curt with the three. It took an effort, especially with Aviendha there. Elayne did not know what she would do if she ever lost her sister. Vandene was not only grieving for a sister, she was searching for Adeleas’s murderer, and there could be no doubt that the killer was Merilille Ceandevin, Careane Fransi or Sareitha Tomares. One of them, or worse, more than one. The charge was hard to believe of Merilille, in her present condition, but it was not easy to believe of any sister. As Birgitte had pointed out, one of the worst Darkfriends she had ever met, during the Trolloc Wars, was a mild-as-milk lad who jumped at loud noises. And poisoned an entire city’s water supply. Aviendha’s suggestion was to put all three to the question, which had horrified Birgitte, but Aviendha was considerably less in awe of Aes Sedai than she once had been. The proper courtesies must be maintained, until there was evidence to convict. Then there would be no courtesy at all.

  “Oh,” Sareitha said, brightening suddenly. “Here’s Captain Mellar. He was a hero again while you were gone, Elayne.”

  Aviendha gripped the hilt of her belt knife, and Birgitte stiff­ened. Careane’s face went very still, very cold, and even Merilille managed a disapproving hauteur. Neither sister made any secret of her dislike for Doilan Mellar.

  With a narrow face, he was not pretty, or even handsome, yet he moved with a swordsman’s lithe grace that spoke of physical strength. As Captain of Elayne’s bodyguard, he rated three golden knots of rank, and he wore them soldered to each shoulder of his brightly burnished breastplate. An ignorant observer might have thought he outranked Birgitte. The falls of snow-white lace at his throat and wrists were twice as thick and twice as long as those worn by any of the Guardswomen, but he had left off the sash again, perhaps because it would have obscured one set of golden knots. He claimed that he wanted nothing more in life than to command her bodyguard, yet he frequently talked of battles he had fought as a mercenary. It seemed he had never been on the losing side, and victory had often come from his unsung efforts on the field. He swept off his white-plumed hat in a deep, flourishing bow, managing his sword deftly with one hand, then offered a slightly lesser to Birgitte with an arm across his chest in salute.

  Elayne arranged a smile on her face. “Sareitha says you were a hero again, Captain Mellar. How so?”

  “Nothing more than my duty to my queen.” Despite a voice thick with self-deprecation, his answering smile was warmer than it should have been. Half the palace thought him the father of Elayne’s child. That she had not crushed that rumor seemed to make him believe he had prospects. The smile never reached his dark eyes, though. They remained as cold as death. “My duty to you is my pleasure, my Queen.”

  “Captain Mellar led another sortie without orders yesterday,” Birgitte said in a carefully even voice. “This time the fighting almost spilled into the Far Madding Gate, which he had ordered left open against his return.” Elayne felt her face growing hard.

  “Oh, no,” Sareitha protested. “It wasn’t like that at all. A hun­dred of Lord Luan’s armsmen tried to reach the city in the night, but they left it too late, and sunrise caught them. So did three times their number of Lord Nasin’s men. If Captain Mellar hadn’t opened the gates and led a rescue, they’d have been cut to pieces in sight of the walls. As it was, he managed to save eighty for your cause.” Smiling, Mellar basked in the Aes Sedai’s praise as if he had not heard Birgitte’s criticism. Of course, he seemed unaware of Careane and Merilille’s disapproving stares, too. He always man­aged to ignore disapproval.

  “How did you know they were Lord Luan’s men, Captain?” Elayne asked quietly. A small smile that should have given Mellar warning appeared on Birgitte’s face. But then, he was one of those who seemed not to believe she was a Warder. Even if he did, few except Warders and Aes Sedai knew what the bond entailed. If anything, Mellar’s expression grew more smug.

  “I didn’t go by banners, my Queen. Anybody can carry a ban­ner. I recognized Jurad Accan through my looking glass. Accan is Luan’s man to his toenails. Once I knew that. . . .” He made a dis­missive gesture in a flurry of lace. “The rest was no more than tak­ing a little exercise.”

  “And did this Jurad Accan bring any message from Lord Luan? Anything signed and sealed, affirming House Norwelyn’s support for Trakand?”

  “Nothing in writing, my Queen, but as I said - ”

  “Lord Luan has not declared for me, Captain.”

  Mellar’s smile faded somewhat. He was unused to being cut short. “But, my Queen, Lady Dyelin says that Luan is as good as in your camp right now. Accan showing up is proof of - ”

  “Of nothing, Captain,” Elayne said coldly. “Perhaps Lord Luan will be in my camp eventually, Captain, but until he declares, you’ve given me eighty men who need to be watched.” Eighty out of a hundred. And how many of hers had he lost? And he had risked Caemlyn doing it, burn him! “Since you can find time in your duties commanding my bodyguard to lead sorties, you can find time to arrange for watching them. I won’t spare anyone from the walls for it. Set Master Accan and his fellows to drilling the men I’ve brought in from the manors. That will keep them all busy and out of trouble most of each day, but I leave it to you how to keep them away from the walls the rest of the time. And I do expect them kept away from the walls and out of trouble, Captain. You may see to it now.”

  Mellar stared at her, stunned. She had never taken him to task before, and he did not like it, particularly in front of so many wit­nesses. There were no over-warm smiles now. His mouth twitched, and a sullen heat grew in his eyes. But there was nothing for him to do except to jerk another bow, murmur “As my Queen commands” in a hoarse voice, and leave with as good a grace as he could muster. Before he had gone three paces he was striding down the hall as if to trample anyone who got in his way. She would have to tell Rasoria to take care. He might try to soothe his bile by taking it out on those who had seen and heard. Merilille and Careane gave almost identical nods; they would have seen Mellar called down, and preferably put out of the palace, long since.

  “Even if he did wrong,” Sareitha said carefully, “and I am not convinced that he did, Captain Mellar saved your life at risk to his own, Elayne, your life and that of the Lady Dyelin. Was there really need to embarrass him in front of the rest of us?”

  “Never think I avoid paying my debts, Sareitha.” Elayne felt Aviendha grip one of her hands, and Birgitte the other. She gave each of them a light squeeze. When you were surrounded by ene­mies, it was good to have a sister and a friend close by. “I am going to find a hot bath now, and unless one of you wishes to scrub my back . . . ?”

  They could recognize a dismissal, and they departed more gracefully than Captain Mellar, Careane and Sareitha already dis­cussing whether or not the Windfinders would actually want les­sons today, Merilille trying to look every direction at once in hope of avoiding any Windfinders. What would they talk of later, though? Whether Elayne was having a spat with the father of her child? Whether they had successfully hidden their guilt in killing Adeleas?

  I always pay my debts, Elayne thought, watching them go. And I help my friends pay theirs.

  CHAPTER 12

  A Bargain

  A bath was not hard to find, though Elayne had to wait in the hall frowning at the lion-carved doors of her apart?
?ments, drafts flickering the mirrored stand-lamps while Rasoria and two of the Guardswomen went in to search. Once they were sure there were no assassins lying in wait, and guards had been arrayed in the corridor and outer room, Elayne entered to find white-haired Essande waiting in the bedchamber with Nans and Sephanie, the two young tirewomen she was training. Essande was slim, with Elayne’s Golden Lily embroidered over her left breast and a very great dignity emphasized by her deliberate way of mov­ing, though some of that came from age and aching joints she refused to acknowledge. Naris and Sephanie were sisters, fresh-faced, sturdy and shy-eyed, proud of their livery and happy to have been chosen out for this rather than cleaning hallways but almost as much in awe of Essande as of Elayne. There were more experi­enced maids available, women who had worked years in the palace, but sadly, girls who had come seeking any sort of work they could find were safer.

  Two copper bathtubs sat on thick layers of toweling laid atop the rose-colored floor tiles where one of the carpets had been rolled up, evidence that word of Elayne’s arrival had flown ahead of her. Servants had a knack for learning what was happening that the Tower’s eyes-and-ears might envy. A good blaze in the fireplace and tight casements in the windows made the room warm after the cor­ridors, and Essande waited only to see Elayne enter the room before sending Sephanie off at a run to fetch the men with the hot water. That would be brought up in double-walled pails with lids to keep it from getting cold on the way from the kitchens, though it might be delayed a little by Guardswomen checking to make sure there were no knives hidden in the water.

  Aviendha eyed the second bathtub almost as doubtfully as Essande eyed Birgitte, the one still uneasy about actually stepping into water and the other still not accepting that anyone more than necessary should be present during a bath, but the white-haired woman wasted no time before quietly bustling Elayne and Aviendha both into the dressing room, where another fire on a wide marble hearth had taken the chill from the air. It was a great relief to have Essande help her out of her riding clothes, knowing that she had more ahead of her than a hasty wash and a show of ease while worrying about how quickly she could move on to her next destination. Other pretenses awaited, the Light help her, and other worries, but she was home, and that counted for much. She could almost forget about that beacon shining in the west. Almost. Well, not at all, really, but she could manage to stop fretting over it as long as she did not dwell on the thing.

  By the time they had been undressed - with Aviendha slap­ping Naris’ hands away and removing her own jewelry, doing her best to pretend that Naris did not exist and her garments were somehow removing themselves - by the time they had been bun­dled into embroidered silk robes and had their hair tied up in white toweling - Aviendha tried to wrap the towel around her own head three times, and only after the construction collapsed down her neck for the third time did she allow Naris to do it, muttering about getting so soft that she soon would need someone to lace up her boots until Elayne began laughing and she joined in, throwing her head back so that Naris had to start over again - by the time all that was done and they had returned to the bedchamber, the bath­tubs were full and the scent of the rose oil that had been added tq the water filled the air. The men who had brought up the water were gone, of course, and Sephanie was waiting with her sleeves pushed above her elbows in case someone wanted her back scrubbed. Birgitte was sitting on the turquoise-inlaid chest at the foot of the bed, her elbows on her knees.

  Elayne allowed Essande to help her off with her pale green, swallow-worked robe and sank into her tub immediately, sub­merging herself to her neck in water just a hair short of too hot. That left her knees poking up, but it immersed most of her in the warmth, and she sighed, feeling weariness leach out of her and lan­guor creep in. Hot water might have been the greatest single gift of civilization.

  Staring at the other tub, Aviendha gave a start when Naris attempted to remove her robe, lavender and embroidered with flowers on the wide sleeves. Grimacing, she finally allowed it, and stepped gingerly into the water, but she snatched the round soap out of Sephanie’s hand and began washing herself vigorously. Vig­orously, but very careful not to slop so much as a spoonful of water over the tub’s rim. The Aiel did use water for washing, as well as in the sweat tents, especially for rinsing out the shampoo they made from a fat leaf that grew in the Waste, yet the dirty water was con­served and used for watering crops. Elayne had shown her two of the great cisterns beneath Caemlyn, fed by a pair of underground rivers and large enough that the far side of each was lost in a forest of thick columns and shadows, but the arid Waste was in Aviendha’s bones.

  Ignoring Essande’s pointed looks - she seldom said two words more than necessary, and thought baths no time to say anything - Birgitte talked while they bathed, though she took care of what she said in front of Naris and Sephanie. It was unlikely they were in the pay of another House, but maids gossiped almost as freely as men - it seemed almost a tradition. Some rumors were worth fos­tering, nonetheless. Mostly Birgitte talked of two huge merchants’ trains that had arrived yesterday from Tear, the wagons heavy with grain and salted beef, and another from Illian with oil and salt and smoked fish. It was always worthwhile reminding people that food continued to flow into the city. Few merchants braved the roads of Andor in winter, none carrying anything as cheap as food, but gateways meant that Arymilla could intercept all the merchants she wished and her forces still would starve long before Caemlyn felt the first pangs of hunger. The Windfinders, who were making most of those gateways, reported that the High Lord Darlin - claiming the title of Steward in Tear for the Dragon Reborn, of all things! - was besieged in the Stone of Tear by nobles who wanted the Dragon Reborn out of Tear completely, but even they were unlikely to try stopping a rich trade in grain, particularly since they believed the Kin who accompanied the Windfinders were Aes Sedai. Not that any real attempt was made at deception, but Great Serpent rings had been made for Kinswomen who had passed their tests for Accepted before being put out of the Tower, and if anyone drew the wrong conclusion, no one actually lied to them.

  The water was going to shed its heat if she waited much longer, Elayne decided, so she took a rose-scented soap from Sephanie and allowed Naris to begin scrubbing her back with a long-handled brush. If there had been news of Gawyn or Galad, Birgitte would have mentioned it straight off. She was as eager to hear as Elayne, and she could not have held it back. Gawyn’s return was one rumor they dearly wanted to reach the streets. Birgitte performed her duties well as Captain-General, and Elayne meant her to keep the position, if she could be convinced, but having Gawyn there would allow both women to relax a little. Most of the soldiers in the city were mercenaries, and only enough of them to man the gates strongly and make a display along the miles of wall surrounding the New City, but they still numbered more than thirty compa­nies, each with its own captain who inevitably was full of pride, obsessed with precedence, and ready to squabble over any imag­ined slight from another captain at the drop of a straw. Gawyn had trained his whole life to command armies. He could deal with the squabblers, leaving her free to secure the throne.

  Apart from that, she simply wanted him away from the White Tower. She prayed that one of her messengers had gotten through and that he was well downriver by this time. Egwene had been besieging Tar Valon with her army for more than a week, now, and it would be the cruelest spinning of fate for Gawyn to be caught between his oaths to defend the Tower and his love for Egwene. Worse, he had already broken that oath once, or at least bent it, for love of his sister and perhaps his love of Egwene. If Elaida ever sus­pected that Gawyn had aided Siuan’s escape, whatever credit he had gained by helping her replace Siuan as Amyrlin would evapo­rate like a dewdrop, and if he was still within Elaida’s reach when she learned, he would find himself in a cell, and lucky to avoid the headsman. Elayne did not resent his decision to aid Elaida; he could not have known enough then to make any other choice. A good many sisters had been confused over what was happeni
ng, too. A good many still seemed to be. How could she ask Gawyn to see what Aes Sedai could not?

  As for Galad. . . . She had grown up unable to like the man, sure he must resent her, and resent Gawyn most of all. Galad had to have thought he would be First Prince of the Sword one day, until Gawyn was born. Her earliest memories of him were of a boy, a young man, already behaving more like a father or uncle than a brother, giving Gawyn his first lessons with a sword. She remem­bered being afraid he would break open Gawyn’s head with the practice blade. But he had never given more than the bruises any youth expected in learning swords. He knew what was right, Galad did, and he was willing to do what was right no matter the cost to anyone, including himself. Light, he had started a war to help her and Nynaeve escape from Samara, and it was likely he had known the risk from the start! Galad fancied Nynaeve, or had for a time - it was hard to imagine he still felt that way, with him a Whitecloak, the Light only knew where and doing what - but the truth was, he had started that war to rescue his sister. She could not condone him being a Child of the Light, she could not like him, yet she hoped that he was safe and well. She hoped he found his way home to Caemlyn, too. News of him would have been nearly as welcome as news of Gawyn. That surprised her, but it was true.