Crossroads of Twilight

  “Yukiri!” a woman’s voice called from back up the hallway.

  A Sitter in the Hall of the Tower did not jump like a startled goat at hearing her own name, but Yukiri did. If she had not been holding on to Meidani, she might have fallen, and as it was, the pair of them staggered like drunken farmers at a harvest dance.

  Recovering, Yukiri jerked her shawl straight and set her face in a scowl that did not diminish when she saw who was hurrying toward her. Seaine was supposed to be keeping close to her own rooms, with as many White sisters around her as she could man­age, when she was not with Yukiri or one of the other Sitters who knew about Talene and the Black Ajah, but here she was scurrying down the hallway with only Bernaile Gelbarn, a stocky Taraboner and another of Meidani’s jackdaws, for company. Leonin stepped aside, and gave Seaine a formal bow, fingertips pressed to his heart. Meidani and Bernaile were foolish enough to exchange smiles. They were friends, but they should know better, when they could not tell who might see.

  Yukiri was in no mood for smiles. “Taking the air, Seaine?” she said sharply. “Saerin won’t be pleased, when I tell her. Not at all pleased. I’m not pleased, Seaine.”

  Meidani made a small sound in her throat, and Bernaile’s head twitched, her multitude of narrow beaded braids rattling against one another. The pair of them took to studying a tapestry that sup­posedly showed the humbling of Queen Rhiannon, and for all their smooth faces, clearly they wished they were somewhere else. In their eyes, Sitters were supposed to be equals. And so they were. Normally. After a fashion. Leonin should not have been able to hear a word, but he could feel Meidani’s mood, of course, and he moved a step farther away. While still keeping watch along the corridor, of course. A good man. A wise man.

  Seaine had sense enough to look abashed. Unconsciously, she smoothed her dress, covered with snowy embroidery along the hem and across the bodice, but almost immediately her hands knotted in her shawl and her eyebrows drew down stubbornly. Seaine had been strong-willed from the day she first came to the Tower, a furniture-maker’s daughter from Lugard who had talked her father into buying passage for her and her mother. Passage for two upriver, but only one down. Strong-willed and confident. And fre­quently as blind to the world around her as any Brown. Whites were often like that, all logic and no judgment. “There’s no need for me to hide from the Black Ajah, Yukiri,” she said.

  Yukiri winced. Fool woman, naming the Black right out in the open. The corridor was still empty in both directions as far as the curve allowed sight, but carelessness led to more careless­ness. She could be stubborn herself, when there was need, but at least she showed more brain than a goose about when and where. She opened her mouth to give Seaine a piece of her mind, a sharp piece, but the other woman rushed on before she could speak.

  “Saerin told me I could find you.” Seaine’s mouth tightened and spots of color flared in her cheeks, at having asked permission or at having to ask. It was understandable for her to resent her sit­uation, of course. Just witless for her not to accept it. “I need to talk to you alone, Yukiri. About the second mystery.”

  For a moment, Yukiri was as puzzled as Meidani and Bernaile looked. They could sham not listening, but that did not shut their ears. Second mystery? What did Seaine mean? Unless. . . . Could she mean the thing that had brought Yukiri into the hunt for the Black Ajah in the first place? Wondering why the heads of the Ajahs were meeting in secret had lost its urgency compared to finding Darkfriends among the sisters.

  “Very well, Seaine,” Yukiri said, more calmly than she felt. “Meidani, take Leonin down the hall until you can just see Seaine and me around the curve. Keep a sharp eye for anyone coming this way. Bernaile, do the same up the hall.” They were moving before she finished speaking, and as soon as they were out of earshot, she turned her attention to Seaine. “Well?”

  To her surprise, the glow of saidar sprang up around the White Sitter, who wove a ward against eavesdropping around the pair of them. It was a clear sign of secrets to anyone who saw. This had better be important.

  “Think about it logically.” Seaine’s voice was calm, but her hands still gripped her shawl in fists. She stood very straight, tow­ering over Yukiri, though she was not much above average height herself. “It’s more than a month, almost two, since Elaida came to me, and nearly two weeks since you found Pevara and me. If the Black Ajah knew about me, I would be dead by now. Pevara and I would have been dead before you and Doesine and Saerin ever walked in on us. Therefore, they don’t know. About any of us. I admit I was frightened, at first, but I have control of myself, now. There’s no reason for the rest of you to keep trying to treat me like a novice,” a little heat invaded the calmness, “and a brainless one, at that.”

  “You’ll have to talk to Saerin,” Yukiri said curtly. Saerin had taken charge from the start - after forty years in the Hall for the Brown, Saerin was very good at taking charge - and Yukiri had no intention of going against her unless she must, not without the Sitter’s privilege she could hardly claim in the circumstances. As well try to catch a falling boulder. If Saerin could be convinced, Pevara and Doesine would come around, and she herself would hardly try to stand in the way. “Now, what about this ‘second secret’? You do mean the Ajah heads’ meeting?”

  Seaine’s face took on a muley expression. Yukiri almost expected her ears to lie back. Then she exhaled. “Did the head of your Ajah have a hand in choosing Andaya for the Hall? More than usual, I mean?”

  “She did,” Yukiri replied carefully. Everyone had been sure Andaya would go into the Hall one day, perhaps in another forty or fifty years, yet Serancha had all but anointed her, when the custom­ary method was discussion until a consensus could be reached on two or three candidates, then a secret ballot. That was Ajah busi­ness, though, as secret as Serancha’s name and title.

  “I knew it.” Seaine nodded excitedly, not at all her normal manner. “Saerin says that Juilaine was handpicked for the Brown, too, apparently not their usual way, and Doesine says the about Suana, though she was hesitant about saying anything. I think Suana may be head of the Yellow herself. In any case, she was a Sitter for forty years the first time, and you know it isn’t common to take a chair after you were a Sitter that long. And Ferane stepped down for the White less than ten years ago; no one has ever entered the Hall again so soon. To cap it off, Talene says the Greens nominate choices and their Captain-General chooses one, but Adelorna chose Rina without any nominations.”

  Yukiri managed to stifle a grimace, but only by a hair. Every­one had their suspicions about who headed other Ajahs, else no one would ever have noticed the meetings in the first place, yet speak­ing those names aloud was rude at best. Anyone but a Sitter might face penance for it. Of course, she and Seaine both knew when it came to Adelorna. In her attempts to curry favor, Talene poured out all the secrets of the Green without being asked. It embarrassed all of them, except Talene herself. At least it explained why the Greens had been in such an outstanding rage when Adelorna was birched. Still, Captain-General was a ridiculous title, Battle Ajah or no Battle Ajah. At least Head Clerk really described what Serancha did, in a manner of speaking.

  Down the corridor, Meidani and her Warder were standing just in sight on the curve, apparently taking quietly. One or the other always watched further down around the curve, though. In the opposite direction, Bernaile was just in sight, too. Her head was swiveling constantly as she tried to watch Yukiri and Seaine while keeping an eye out for anyone approaching. The way she kept shifting from one foot to the other would attract attention, too, but these days a sister alone outside her Ajah quarter was asking for trouble, and she knew it. This conversation had to end soon.

  Yukiri raised one finger. “Five Ajahs had to choose new Sitters after women they had in the Hall joined the rebels.” Seaine nod­ded, and Yukiri raised a second finger. “Each of those Ajahs chose a woman as Sitter who wasn’t the . . . logical . . . choice.” Seaine nodded again. A third finger joined the first two. “The
Brown had to choose two new Sitters, but you didn’t mention Shevan. Is there anything . . .” Yukiri smiled wryly, “odd . . . about her?”

  “No; according to Saerin, Shevan would likely have been her replacement when she decided to step down, but - ”

  “Seaine, if you’re actually implying the Ajah heads conspired over who would go into the Hall - and I never heard a more crack-brained notion! - if that’s what you’re suggesting, why would they choose five odd women and one who isn’t?”

  “Yes, I am suggesting it. With the rest of you keeping me prac­tically under lock and key, I’ve had more time for thinking than I know what to do with. Juilaine and Rina and Andaya gave me a hint, and Ferane made me decide to check.” What did Seaine mean about Andaya and the other two giving a hint? Oh. Of course: Rina and Andaya were not really old enough to be in the Hall yet, either. The custom of not talking about age soon enough became the habit of not thinking about it, either.

  “Two might have been coincidence,” Seaine went on, “even three, though that strains credulity, but five makes a pattern. Except for the Blue, the Brown was the only Ajah to have two Sit­ters join the rebels. Maybe there’s a reason in that why they chose one odd sister and one not, if I can figure it out. But there is a pat­tern, Yukiri - a puzzle - and whether it’s rational or not, some­thing tells me we had better solve it before the rebels get here. It makes me feel as though somebody’s hand is on my shoulder, but when I look, there isn’t anyone there.”

  What strained credulity was the idea of the Ajah heads con­spiring in the first place. But then, Yukiri thought, a conspiracy of Sitters is beyond far-fetched, and I’m in the middle of one. And there was the simple fact that no one outside an Ajah was supposed to know the Ajah’s head, but the Ajah heads against all custom did. “If there’s a puzzle,” she said wearily, “you have a long time to solve it. The rebels can’t leave Murandy before spring, whatever they’ve told people, and the march upriver will take months, if they hold their army together that long.” She did not doubt they would, though, not any longer. “Go back to your rooms before someone sees us standing here warded, and think on your puzzle,” she said, not unkindly, resting a hand on Seaine’s sleeve. “You’ll have to put up with being looked after until we’re all sure you are safe.”

  The expression on Seaine’s face would have been called sullen on anyone but a Sitter. “I’ll speak to Saerin again,” she said, but the light of saidar around her vanished.

  Watching her join Bernaile and the two of them glide up the curving hallway toward the Ajah quarters, both as wary as fawns when wolves were out, Yukiri felt a heavy heart. It was a pity the rebels could not get there before summer. At least that might make the Ajahs come together again, so sisters were not forced to slink about the White Tower. As well wish for wings, she thought sadly.

  Determined to keep her mood in check, she went to gather up Meidani and Leonin. She had a Black sister to investigate, and at least investigation was a puzzle she knew how to work.

  Gawyn’s eyes popped open in the darkness as a new wave of cold rose into the hayloft. The barn’s thick stone walls normally kept out the worst of the night’s chill, if only the worst. Voices mur­mured below; no one sounded excited. He took his hand away from the sword lying beside him and tugged his gauntlets tighter. Like all the rest of the Younglings, he slept in every stitch he could put on. Probably it was just time to wake some of the men around him for their sentry turns, but he was fully awake now himself, and he doubted he would find sleep again soon. In any case, his sleep was always fretful, troubled by dark dreams, haunted by the woman he loved. He did not know where Egwene was, or whether she was alive. Or whether she could forgive him. He stood up, letting the loose hay he had pulled over himself slide off his cloak, and buck­led on his sword belt.

  As he picked his way among the shadowy mounds of men sleeping atop the stacked bales of hay, the faint scrape of boots on wooden rungs told him someone was climbing the ladder to the loft. A dim figure appeared at the top of the ladder, then stopped to wait for him.

  “Lord Gawyn?” Rajar’s deep voice said softly, in a Domani accent unaltered by six years’ training in Tar Valon. The First Lieu­tenant’s rumbling voice was always a surprise, coming from a slight man who stood barely higher than Gawyn’s shoulder. Even so, had times been different, Rajar surely would have been a Warder by this time. “I thought I’d have to wake you. A sister just arrived, on foot. A messenger from the Tower. She wanted the sis­ter in charge here. I told Tomil and his brother to take her to the Mayor’s house before they turned in for the night.”

  Gawyn sighed. He should have gone home when he returned to Tar Valon and found the Younglings expelled from the city, instead of letting himself be caught here by winter. Especially when he was sure Elaida wanted them all dead. His sister Elayne would come to Caemiyn, eventually, if she was not already there. Certainly any Aes Sedai would see that the Daughter-Heir of Andor reached Caemiyn in time to claim the throne before someone else could. The White Tower would not give up the advantage of a queen who would also be Aes Sedai. On the other hand, Elayne could be on her way to Tar Valon, too, or residing in the White Tower right that minute. He did not know how she had become entangled with Siuan Sanche, or how deeply - she always dove into a pond with­out checking the depth - but Elaida and the Hall of the Tower might want to question her closely, Daughter-Heir or not. Queen or not. He was sure she could not be held accountable, though. She was still only one of the Accepted. He had to tell himself that fre­quently.

  The newest problem was that an army lay between him and Tar Valon, now. At least twenty-five thousand soldiers on this side of the River Erinin and, he had to believe, as many on the west bank. They had to be supporting the Aes Sedai whom Elaida called rebels. Who else would dare besiege Tar Valon itself? The way that army had appeared, though, seeming to materialize out of nowhere in the middle of a snowstorm, was enough to raise prickles on his back still. Rumor and alarms always flew ahead of any large force under arms on the march. Always. This one had arrived like spirits, in silence. The army was as real as stone, however, so he could nei­ther enter Tar Valon to find whether Elayne was in the Tower, nor ride south. Any army would take notice of upward of three hun­dred men on the move, and the rebels would have no goodwill toward the Younglings. Even if he went alone, travel in winter was very slow, and he could reach Caemiyn as quickly if he waited until spring. There was no hope of finding passage on a ship, either. The siege would mire river traffic in a hopeless snarl. He was mired in a hopeless snarl.

  And now, an Aes Sedai had come in the middle of the night. She would not simplify matters any.

  “Let’s find out what news she brought,” he said quietly, motioning Rajar down the ladder ahead of him.

  Twenty horses and their stacked saddles crowded nearly every inch of the dark barn not taken by Mistress Millin’s two dozen or so milkcows in their stalls, so he and Rajar had to thread their way to the wide doors. The only warmth came from the sleeping animals. The two men guarding the horses were silent shadows, but Gawyn could feel them watching Rajar and him slip out into the icy night. They would know about the messenger, and be wondering.

  The sky was clear, and the waning moon still gave a fair light. The village of Dorian shone with snow. Holding their cloaks close, the pair of them trudged knee-deep through the village in silence, along what had once been the road to Tar Valon from a city that had not existed for hundreds of years. Nowadays, nobody traveled in this direction from Tar Valon except to come to Dorian, and there was no reason to come in winter. By tradition, the village supplied cheeses to the White Tower and to no one else. It was a tiny place, just fifteen slate-roofed, gray stone houses with drifts of snow piled up as high as the bottoms of the first-floor windows. A little distance behind each house stood its cowbarn, all crowded with men and horses now, as well as cows. Most of Tar Valon might well have forgotten Dorian existed. Who thought about where cheese came from? It had seemed a very go
od place for keeping out of sight. Until now.

  All the houses but one in the village were dark. Light leaked through the shutters on several windows of Master Burlow’s dwelling, upstairs and down. Garon Burlow had the misfortune to own the largest house in Dorian, in addition to being Mayor. Vil­lagers who had shifted sleeping arrangements to find a bed for an Aes Sedai must be regretting it by now; Master Burlow had had two rooms already empty.

  Stamping the snow from his boots on the stone step, Gawyn rapped at the Mayor’s stout door with a gauntleted fist. No one answered, and after a moment he lifted the latch and led Rajar in.

  The beam-ceilinged front room was fairly large for a farm­house, and dominated by several tall open-front cabinets, full of pewter and glazed crockery, and a long, polished table lined with high-back chairs. All of the oil lamps had been lit, an extravagance in winter, when a few tallow candles would do, but the flames in the fireplace had made little impression on the split logs, yet, or on the temperature of the room. Even so, the two sisters who had rooms above were barefoot on the rugless wooden floor, with fur-lined cloaks flung hastily over their linen nightdresses. Katerine Alruddin and Tarna Feir were watching a small woman in a dark, yellow-slashed riding dress and cloak that were snow-damp to her hips. She stood as near the wide hearth as she would, tiredly warm­ing her hands and shivering. Afoot in the snow, she could not have made the trip from Tar Valon in less than two or three days, and even Aes Sedai felt the cold eventually. She had to be the sister Rajar had spoken of, yet compared to the others, the agelessness was hardly noticeable in her. Compared to the other two, she was hardly noticeable at all.

  The absence of the Mayor and his wife put an extra knot in Gawyn’s middle, though he had half expected it. They would have been there making over the Aes Sedai, offering hot drinks and food, no matter the hour, unless they had been sent back to their bed to give Katerine and Tarna privacy with the messenger. Which likely meant he was a fool to want to know the message. But he had known that before he left the barn.