The Dragon Reborn twot-3 Page 4

  How did she know that? He shook his head irritably, shaggy hair swaying. "The Creator made the world," he muttered, "not I. I must live the best I can in the world the way it is."

  "So sad for one so young," she said softly. "Why so sad?"

  "I should be watching, not talking," he said curtly. "You won't thank me if I get you lost." He heeled Stepper forward enough to cut off any further conversation, but he could feel her looking at him. Sad? I'm not sad, just… Light, I don't know. There ought to be a better way, that's all. The itching tickle came again at the back of his head, but absorbed in ignoring Leya's eyes on his back, he ignored that, too.

  Over the slope of the mountain and down they rode, across a forested valley with a broad stream running cold along its bottom, knee-deep on the horses. In the distance, the side of a mountain had been carved into the semblance of two towering forms. A man and a woman, Perrin thought they might be, though wind and rain had long since made that uncertain. Even Moiraine claimed to be unsure who they were supposed to be, or when the granite had been cut.

  Pricklebacks and small trout darted away from the horses' hooves, silver flashes in the clear water. A deer raised its head from browsing, hesitated as the party rode up out of the stream, then bounded off into the trees, and a large mountain cat, gray striped and spotted with black, seemed to rise out of the ground, frustrated in its stalk. It eyed the horses a moment, and with a lash of its tail vanished after the deer. But there was little life visible in the mountains yet. Only a handful of birds perched on limbs or pecked at the ground where the snow had melted. More would return to the heights in a few weeks, but not yet. They saw no other ravens.

  It was late afternoon by the time Perrin led them between two steep sloped mountains, snowy peaks as ever wrapped in cloud, and turned up a smaller stream that splashed downward over gray stones in a series of tiny waterfalls. A bird called in the trees, and another answered it from ahead.

  Perrin smiled. Bluefinch calls. A Borderland bird. No one rode this way without being seen. He rubbed his nose, and did not look at the tree the first "bird" had called from.

  Their path narrowed as they rode up through scrubby leatherleaf and a few gnarled mountain oaks. The ground level enough to ride beside the stream became barely wider than a man on horseback, and the stream itself no more than a tall man could step across.

  Perrin heard Leya behind him, murmuring to herself. When he looked over his shoulder, she was casting worried glances up the steep slopes to either side. Scattered trees perched precariously above them. It appeared impossible they would not fall. The Shienarans rode easily, at last beginning to relax.

  Abruptly a deep, oval bowl between the mountains opened out before them, its sides steep but not nearly so precipitous as the narrow passage. The stream rose from a small spring at its far end. Perrin's sharp eyes picked out a man with the topknot of a Shienaran, up in the limbs of an oak to his left. Had a redwinged jay called instead of a bluefinch, he would not have been alone, and the way in would not have been so easy. A handful of men could hold that passage against an army. If an army came, a handful would have to.

  Among the trees around the bowl stood log huts, not readily visible, so that those gathered around the cook fires at the bottom of the bowl seemed at first to be without shelter. There were fewer than a dozen in sight. And not many more out of sight, Perrin knew. Most of them looked around at the sound of horses, and some waved. The bowl seemed filled with the smells of men and horses, of cooking and burning wood. A long white banner hung limply from a tall pole near them. One form, at least half again as tall as anyone else, sat on a log engrossed in a book that was small in his huge hands. That one's attention never wavered, even when the only other person without a topknot shouted, "So you found her, did you? I thought you'd be gone the night, this time." It was a young woman's voice, but she wore a boy's coat and breeches and had her hair cut short.

  A burst of wind swirled into the bowl, making cloaks flap and rippling the banner out to its full length. For a moment the creature on it seemed to ride the wind. A four-legged serpent scaled in gold and blue, golden maned like a lion, and its feet each tipped with five golden claws. A banner of legend. A banner most men would not know if they saw it, but would fear when they learned its name.

  Perrin waved a hand that took it all in as he led the way down into the bowl. "Welcome to the camp of the Dragon Reborn, Leya."

  Chapter 2

  (Dragon's Fang)

  Saidin

  Face expressionless, the Tuatha'an woman stared at the banner as it drooped again, then turned her attention to those around the fire. Especially the one reading, the one half again as tall as Perrin and twice a big. "You have an Ogier with you. I would not have thought…" She shook her head. "Where is Moiraine Sedai?" It seemed the Dragon banner might as well not exist as far as she was concerned.

  Perrin gestured coward the rough hut that stood furthest up the slope, at the far end of the bowl. With walls and sloping roof of unpeeled logs, it was the largest, though not very big at that. Perhaps just barely large enough to be called a cabin rather than a hut. "That one is hers. Hers and Lan's. He is her Warder. When you have had something hot to drink — "

  "No. I must speak to Moiraine."

  He was not surprised. All the women who came insisted on speaking to Moiraine immediately, and alone. The news that Moiraine chose to share with the rest of them did not always seem very important, but the women held the intensity of a hunter stalking the last rabbit in the world for his starving family. The half-frozen old beggar woman had refused blankets and a plate of hot stew and tramped up to Moiraine's hut, barefoot in still-falling snow.

  Leya slid from her saddle and handed the reins up to Perrin. "Will you see that she is fed?" She patted the piebald mare's nose. "Piesa is not used to carrying me over such rugged country."

  "Fodder is scarce, still," Perrin told her, "but she'll have what we can give her."

  Leya nodded, and went hurrying away up the slope without another word, holding her bright green skirts up, the blue-embroidered red cloak swaying behind her.

  Perrin swung down from his saddle, exchanging a few words with the men who came from the fires to take the horses. He gave his bow to the one who took Stepper. No, except for one raven, they had seen nothing but the mountains and the Tuatha'an woman. Yes, the raven was dead. No, she had told them nothing of what was happening outside the mountains. No, he had no idea whether they would be leaving soon.

  Or ever, he added to himself. Moiraine had kept them there all winter. The Shienarans did not think she gave the orders, not here, but Perrin knew that Aes Sedai somehow always seemed to get their way. Especially Moiraine.

  Once the horses were led away to the rude log stable, the riders went to warm themselves. Perrin tossed his cloak back over his shoulders and held his hands out to the flames gratefully. The big kettle, Baerlon work by the look of it, gave off smells that had been making his mouth water for some time already. Someone had been lucky hunting today, it seemed, and lumpy roots circled another fire close by, giving off an aroma faintly like turnips as they roasted. He wrinkled his nose and concentrated on the stew. More and more he wanted meat above anything else.

  The woman in men's clothes was peering toward Leya, who was just disappearing into Moiraine's hut.

  "What do you see, Min?" he asked.

  She came to stand beside him, her dark eyes troubled. He did not understand why she insisted on breeches instead of skirts. Perhaps it was because he knew her, but he could not see how anyone could look at her and see a too-handsome youth instead of a pretty young woman.

  "The Tinker woman is going to die," she said softly, eyeing the others near the fires. None was close enough to hear.

  He was still, thinking of Leya's gentle face. Ah, Light! Tinkers never harm anyone! He felt cold despite the warmth of the fire. Burn me, I wish I'd never asked. Even the few Aes Sedai who knew of it did not understand what Min did. Sometimes she saw image
s and auras surrounding people, and sometimes she even knew what they meant.

  Masuto came to stir the stew with a long wood spoon. The Shienaran eyed them, then laid a finger alongside his long nose and grinned widely before he left.

  "Blood and ashes!" Min muttered. "He's probably decided we are sweethearts murmuring to each other by the fire."

  "Are you sure?" Perrin asked. She raised her eyebrows at him, and he hastily added, "About Leya."

  "Is that her name? I wish I didn't know. It always makes it worse, knowing and not being able to… Perrin, I saw her own face floating over her shoulder, covered in blood, eyes staring. It's never any clearer than that." She shivered and rubbed her hands together briskly. "Light, but I wish I saw more happy things. All the happy things seem to have gone away."

  He opened his mouth to suggest warning Leya, then closed it again. There was never any doubt about what Min saw and knew, for good or bad. If she was certain, it happened.

  "Blood on her face," he muttered. "Does that mean she'll die by violence?" He winced that he said it so easily. But what can I do? If I tell Leya, if I make her believe somehow, she'll live her last days in fear, and it will change nothing.

  Min gave a short nod.

  If she's going to die by violence, it could mean an attack on the camp. But there were scouts out every day, and guards set day and night. And Moiraine had the camp warded, so she said; no creature of the Dark One would see it unless he walked right into it. He thought of the wolves. No! The scouts would find anyone or anything trying to approach the camp. "It's a long way back to her people," he said half to himself. "Tinkers wouldn't have brought their wagons any further than the foothills. Anything could happen between here and there."

  Min nodded sadly. "And there aren't enough of us to spare even one guard for her. Even if it would do any good."

  She had told him; she had tried warning people about bad things when, at six or seven, she had first realized not everyone could see what she saw. She would not say more, but he had the impression that her warnings had only made matters worse, when they were believed at all. It took some doing to believe in Min's viewings until you had proof.

  "When?" he said. The word was cold in his ears, and hard as tool steel. I can't do anything ahout Leya, but maybe I can figure out whether we're going to be attacked.

  As soon as the word was out of his mouth, she threw up her hands. She kept her voice down, though. "It isn't like that. I can never tell when something is going to happen. I only know it will, if I even know what I see means. You don't understand. The seeing doesn't come when I want it to, and neither does knowing. It just happens, and sometimes I know. Something. A little bit. It just happens." He tried to get a soothing word in, but she was letting it all out in a flood he could not stem. "I can see things around a man one day and not the next, or the other way 'round. Most of the time, I don't see anything around anyone. Aes Sedai always have images around them, of course, and Warders, though it's always harder to say what it means with them than with anyone else." She gave Perrin a searching look, half squinting. "A few others always do, too."

  "Don't tell me what you see when you look at me," he said harshly, then shrugged his heavy shoulders. Even as a child he had been bigger than most of the others, and he had quickly learned how easy it was to hurt people by accident when you were bigger than they. It had made him cautious and careful, and regretful of his anger when he let it show. "I am sorry, Min. I shouldn't have snapped at you. I did not mean to hurt you."

  She gave him a surprised look. "You didn't hurt me. Blessed few people want to know what I see. The Light knows, I would not, if it were someone else who could do it." Even the Aes Sedai had never heard of anyone else who had her gift. "Gift" was how they saw it, even if she did not.

  "It's just that I wish there were something I could do about Leya. I couldn't stand it the way you do, knowing and not able to do anything."

  "Strange," she said softly, "how you seem to care so much about the Tuatha'an. They are utterly peaceful, and I always see violence around —"

  He turned his head away, and she cut off abruptly.

  "Tuatha'an?" came a rumbling voice, like a huge bumblebee. "What about the Tuatha'an?" The Ogier came to join them at the fire, marking his place in his book with a finger the size of a large sausage. A thin streamer of tabac smoke rose from the pipe in his other hand. His high-necked coat of dark brown wool buttoned up to the neck, and flared at the knee over turned-down boot tops. Perrin stood hardly as high as his chest.

  Loial's face had frightened more than one person, with his nose broad enough almost to be called a snout and his too-wide mouth. His eyes were the size of saucers, with thick eyebrows that dangled like mustaches almost to his cheeks, and his ears poked up through long hair in ruffed points. Some who had never seen an Ogier took him for a Trolloc, though Trollocs were as much legend to most of them as Ogier.

  Loial's wide smile wavered and his eyes blinked as he became aware of having interrupted them. Perrin wondered how anyone could be frightened of the Ogier for long. Yet some of the old stories call them fierce, and implacable as enemies. He could not believe it. Ogier were enemies to no one.

  Min told Loial of Leya's arrival, but not of what she had seen. She was usually closemouthed about those seeings, especially when they were bad. Instead, she added, "You should know how I feel, Loial, suddenly caught up by Aes Sedai and these Two Rivers folk."

  Loial made a noncommittal sound, but Min seemed to take it for agreement.

  "Yes," she said emphatically. "There I was, living my life in Baerlon as I liked it, when suddenly I was grabbed up by the scruff of the neck and jerked off to the Light knows where. Well, I might as well have been. My life has not been my own since I met Moiraine. And these Two Rivers farmboys." She rolled her eyes at Perrin, a wry twist to her mouth. "All I wanted was to live as I pleased, fall in love with a man I chose…" Her cheeks reddened suddenly, and she cleared her throat. "I mean to say, what is wrong with wanting to live your life without all this upheaval?"

  "Ta'veren," Loial began. Perrin waved at him to stop, but the Ogier could seldom be slowed, much less stopped, when one of his enthusiasms had him in its grip. He was accounted extremely hasty, by the Ogier way of looking at things. Loial pushed his book into a coat pocket and went on, gesturing with his pipe. "All of us, all of our lives, affect the lives of others, Min. As the Wheel of Time weaves us into the Pattern, the life-thread of each of us pulls and tugs at the life-threads around us. Ta'veren are the same, only much, much more so. They tug at the entire Pattern — for a time, at least — forcing it to shape around them. The closer you are to them, the more you are affected personally. It's said that if you were in the same room with Artur Hawkwing, you could feel the Pattern rearranging itself. I don't know how true that is, but I've read that it was. But it doesn't only work one way. Ta'veren themselves are woven to a tighter line than the rest of us, with fewer choices."

  Perrin grimaced. Bloody few of the ones that matter.

  Min tossed, her head. "I just wish they didn't have to be so… so bloody ta'veren all the time. Ta'veren tugging on one side, and Aes Sedai meddling on the other. What chance does a woman have?"

  Loial shrugged. "Very little, I suppose, as long as she stays close to ta'veren."

  "As if I had a choice," Min growled.

  "It was your good fortune — or misfortune, if you see it that way — to fall in with not one, but three ta'veren. Rand, Mat, and Perrin. I myself count it very good fortune, and would even if they weren't my friends. I think I might even…" The Ogier looked at them, suddenly shy, his ears twitching. "Promise you will not laugh? I think I might write a book about it. I have been taking notes."

  Min smiled, a friendly smile, and Loial's ears pricked back up again. "That's wonderful," she told him. "But some of us feel as if we're being danced about like puppets by these ta'veren."

  "I didn't ask for it," Perrin burst out. "I did not ask for it."

 
She ignored him. "Is that what happened to you, Loial? Is that why you travel with Moiraine? I know you Ogier almost never leave your stedding. Did one of these ta'veren tug you along with him?"

  Loial became engrossed in a study of his pipe. "I just wanted to see the groves the Ogier planted," he muttered. "Just to see the groves." He glanced at Perrin as if asking for help, but Perrin only grinned.

  Let's see how the shoe nails onto your hoof. He did not know all of it, but he did know Loial had run away. He was ninety years old, but not yet old enough by Ogier standards to leave the stedding — going Outside, they called it — without the permission of the Elders. Ogier lived a very long time, as humans saw things. Loial said the Elders would not be best pleased when they put their hands on him again. He seemed intent on putting that moment off as long as possible.

  There was a stir among the Shienarans, men getting to their feet. Rand was coming out of Moiraine's hut.

  Even at that distance Perrin could make him out clearly, a young man with reddish hair and gray eyes. He was of an age with Perrin, and would stand half a head taller if they were side by side, though Rand was more slender, if still broad across the shoulders. Embroidered golden thorns ran up the sleeves of his high-collared, red coat, and on the breast of his dark cloak stood the same creature as on the banner, the four-legged serpent with the golden mane. Rand and he had grown up together as friends. Are we still friends? Can we be? Now?

  The Shienarans bowed as one, heads held up but hands to knees. "Lord Dragon," Uno called, "we stand ready. Honor to serve."

  Uno, who could hardly say a sentence without a curse, spoke now with the deepest respect. The others echoed him. "Honor to serve." Masema, who saw ill in everything, and whose eyes now shone with utter devotion; Ragan; all of them, awaiting a command if it were Rand's pleasure to give one.

  From the slope Rand stared down at them a moment, then turned and disappeared into the trees.

  "He has been arguing with Moiraine again," Min said quietly. "All day, this time."