Well, Loial thought, maybe Mat sneaked by me and went back to Merrilor. Never staying put, these men. Always so hasty . . . .
*
Matrim Cauthon sauntered into the Seanchan camp on the south side of Merrilor, away from the piles of the dead.
All around, Seanchan men and women gasped, hands to their mouths. He tipped his hat to them.
"The Prince of the Ravens!" Hushed tones moved through camp ahead of him, passing from mouth to mouth like the last bottle of brandy on a cold night.
He walked right up to Tuon, who stood at a large map table at the camp center talking to Selucia. Karede, Mat noticed, had survived. The man probably felt guilty about it.
Tuon looked at Mat and frowned. "Where have you been?"
Mat raised his arm, and Tuon frowned, looking upward at nothing. Mat spun and thrust his hand farther toward the sky.
Nightflowers began to explode high above the camp.
Mat grinned. Aludra had taken a little convincing, but only a little. She did so like to make things explode.
It was not truly dusk yet, but the show was still grand. Aludra now had half of the dragoners trained to build fireworks and handle her powders. She seemed far less secretive than she once had.
The sounds of the display washed over them.
"Fireworks?" Tuon said.
"The best bloody firework show in the history of my land or yours", Mat said.
Tuon frowned. The explosions reflected in her dark eyes. "I’m with child", she said. "The Doomseer has confirmed it".
Mat felt a jolt, as sure as if a firework had gone off inside of his stomach. An heir. A son, no doubt! What odds that it was a boy? Mat forced a grin. "Well, I guess I’m off the hook, now. You have an heir".
"I have an heir", Tuon said, "but I am the one off that hook. Now I can kill you, if I want".
Mat felt his grin widen. "Well, we’ll have to see what we can work out. Tell me, do you ever play dice?"
*
Perrin sat down among the dead and finally started weeping.
Gai’shain in white and city women picked through the dead. There was no sign of Faile. None at all.
I can’t keep going. How long had it been since he’d slept? That one night in Mayene. His body complained that it hadn’t been nearly enough. He’d pushed himself long before that, spending the equivalent of weeks in the wolf dream.
Lord and Lady Bashere were dead. Faile would have been queen, if she’d lived. Perrin shook and trembled, and he could not make himself move any more. There were hundreds of thousands of dead on this battlefield. The other searchers ignored a body if it had no life, marking it and moving on. He had tried to spread the word for them to seek Faile, but the searchers had to look for the living.
Fireworks exploded in the darkening sky. Perrin buried his head in his hands, then felt himself slide sideways and collapse among the corpses.
*
Moghedien winced at the display in the sky. Each explosion made her see that deadly fire again, tearing through the Sharans. That flare of light, that moment of panic.
And then . . . and then darkness. She’d awakened some time later, left for dead among the bodies of Sharans. When she’d come to, she had found these fools all across the battlefield, claiming to have won the day.
Claiming? she thought, wincing again as another round of fireworks sounded. The Great Lord has fallen. All was lost.
No. No. She continued forward, keeping her step firm, unsuspicious. She had strangled a worker, then taken her form, channeling only a tiny bit and inverting the weave. That should let her escape from this place. She wove around bodies, ignoring the stink to the air.
All was not lost. She still lived. And she was of the Chosen! That meant . . . that meant that she was an empress among her lessers. Why, the Great Lord was imprisoned again, so he could not punish her. And certainly most, if not all, of the other Chosen were dead or imprisoned. If that were true, no one could rival her in knowledge.
This might actually work out. This might be a victory. She stopped beside an overturned supply cart, clutching her cour’souvra—it was still whole, thankfully. She smiled with a wide grin, then wove a small light to illuminate her way.
Yes . . . Look at the open sky, not the thunderclouds. She could turn this to her advantage. Why . . . in the matter of a few years, she could be ruling the world herself!
Something cold snapped around her neck.
Moghedien reached up with horror, then screamed. "No! Not again!" Her disguise melted away and the One Power left her.
A smug-looking suldam stood behind. "They said we could not take any who called themselves Aes Sedai. But you, you do not wear one of their rings, and you skulk like one who has done something wrong. I do not think you will be missed at all".
"Free me!" Moghedien said, scratching at the a’dam. "Free me, you—"
Pain sent her to the ground, writhing.
"I am called Shanan", the suldam said as another woman approached, a damane in tow. "But you may call me mistress. I think that we should return to Ebou Dar quickly".
Her companion nodded, and the damane made a gateway.
They had to drag Moghedien through.
*
Nynaeve emerged from the Healing tent at Shayol Ghul. The sun was almost below the horizon.
"He’s dead", she whispered to the small crowd gathered outside.
Saying the words felt like dropping a brick onto her own feet. She did not cry. She had shed those tears already. That did not mean that she didn’t hurt.
Lan came out of the tent behind her, putting an arm around her shoulders. She raised her hand to his. Nearby, Min and Elayne looked at one another.
Gregorin whispered to Darlin—he had been found, half dead, in the wreckage of his tent. Both of them frowned at the women. Nynaeve overheard part of what Gregorin said. ". . . expected the Aiel savage to be heartless, and maybe the Queen of Andor, but the other one? Not a tear".
"They’re shocked", Darlin replied.
No, Nynaeve thought, studying Min and Elayne. Those three know something I do not. I’ll have to beat it out of them.
"Excuse me", Nynaeve said, walking away from Lan.
He followed.
She raised an eyebrow at him.
"You shall not be rid of me in the next few weeks, Nynaeve", he said, love pulsing through his bond. "Even if you want it".
"Stubborn ox", she grumbled. "As I recall, you are the one who insisted on leaving me so that you could march alone toward your presumed destiny".
"And you were right about that", Lan said. "As you so often are". He said it so calmly that it was hard to be mad at him.
Besides, it was the women she was mad at. She chose Aviendha first and stalked up to her, Lan by her side.
". . . with Rhuarc dead", Aviendha was saying to Sorilea and Bair, "I think that whatever I saw must be able to change. It has already".
"I saw your vision, Aviendha", Bair said. "Or something like it, through different eyes. I think it is a warning of something we must not let happen".
The other two nodded, then glanced at Nynaeve and grew as still-faced as Aes Sedai. Aviendha was just as bad as the others, completely calm as she sat in her chair, her feet wrapped in bandages. She might walk again someday, but she would never fight.
"Nynaeve al’Meara", Aviendha said.
"Did you hear me say that Rand is dead?" Nynaeve demanded. "He went silently".
"He that was wounded has woken from the dream", Aviendha said evenly. "It is as all must do. His death was accomplished in greatness, and he will be celebrated in greatness".
Nynaeve leaned down. "All right", she said menacingly, embracing the Source. "Out with it. I chose you because you can’t run away from me".
Aviendha displayed a moment of what might have been fear. It was gone in a flash. "Let us prepare his pyre".
*
Perrin ran in the wolf dream. Alone.
Other wolves howled their sorrow for his grief. After he passed them, they would return to their celebrations, but that did not make their empathy any less real.
He did not howl. He did not cry out. He became Young Bull, and he ran.
He did not want to be here. He wanted slumber, true slumber. There, he could not feel the pain. Here he could.
I shouldn’t have left her.
A thought of men. Why did it creep in!
But what could I do? I promised not to treat her like glass.
Run. Run fast. Run until exhaustion came!
I had to go to Rand. I had to. But in doing so, I failed her!
To the Two Rivers in a flash. Back out, along the river. The Waste, then back, a long run toward Falme.
How could I be expected to hold them both, then let one go?
To Tear. Then to the Two Rivers. A blur, growling, moving as quickly as he could. Here. Here he had wed her.
Here he howled.
Caemlyn, Cairhien, Dumai’s Wells.
Here he saved one of them.
Cairhien, Ghealdan, Malden.
Here he had saved another.
Two forces in his life. Each had pulled at him. Young Bull finally collapsed near some hills somewhere in Andor. A familiar place.
The place where I met Elyas.
He became Perrin again. His thoughts were not wolf thoughts, his troubles not wolf troubles. He stared up at the sky that was now, after Rand's sacrifice, empty of clouds. He had wanted to be with his friend as he died.
This time, he would be with Faile where she had died.
He wanted to scream, but it would do no good. "I have to let go, don’t I?" he whispered toward that sky. "Light. I don’t want to. I learned. I learned from Malden. I didn’t do it again! I did what I was supposed to, this time".
Somewhere nearby, a bird cried in the sky. Wolves howled. Hunting.
"I learned . . ".
A bird’s cry.
It sounded like a falcon.
Perrin threw himself to his feet, spinning. There. He vanished in an instant, appearing on an open field he did not recognize. No, he knew this field. He knew it! This was Merrilor, only without the blood, without the grass churned to mud, without the land blasted and broken.
Here he found a tiny falcon—as small as his hand—crying softly, with a broken leg pinned beneath a rock. Its heartbeat was faint.
Perrin roared as he woke, clawing his way out of the wolf dream. He stood up on the field of bodies, shouting into the night sky. Searchers nearby scattered in fear.
Where? In the darkness, could he find the same place? He ran, stumbling over corpses, through pits made by channelers or dragons. He stopped, looking one way, then another. Where. Where!
Flowery soap. A hint of perfume in the air. Perrin dashed toward it, throwing his weight against the corpse of an enormous Trolloc, lying almost chest-high atop other bodies. Beneath it, he found the carcass of a horse. Unable to truly consider what he was doing, or of the strength it should have required, Perrin pulled the horse aside.
Beneath, Faile lay bloodied in a small hollow in the ground, breathing shallowly. Perrin cried out and dropped to his knees, cradling her in his arms, breathing in her scent.
It took him only two heartbeats to shift into the wolf dream, carry Faile to Nynaeve far to the north and shift out. Seconds later, he felt her being Healed in his arms, unwilling to let go of her even for that.
Faile, his falcon, trembled and stirred. Then she opened her eyes and smiled at him.