"Mat? Why Mat?"
"It is nothing", Moiraine said. "Something I am not supposed to know. You are still a wide-eyed sheepherder at heart. I would not have it any other way. Lews Therin, for all of his wisdom and power, could not do what you must. Now, if you would be kind, fetch me some tea".
"Yes, Moiraine Sedai", he said, immediately starting toward the teapot over the fire. He froze, then looked back at her.
She glanced at him slyly. "Merely seeing if that still worked".
"I never fetched you tea", Rand protested, walking back to her. "As I remember, I spent our last few weeks together ordering you around".
"So you did", Moiraine said. "Think about what I said regarding the Dark One. But now I ask you a different question. What will you do now? Why go to Ebou Dar?"
"The Seanchan", Rand said. "I must try to bring them to our side, as I promised".
"If I remember", Moiraine said, "you did not promise that you would try, you promised that you would make it happen".
"Promises to 'try’ don’t achieve much in political negotiations", Rand said, "no matter how sincere". He held up his hand before him, arm outstretched, fingers up, and looked out of his open tent flaps. As if he were preparing to grab the lands to the south. Scoop them up, claim them as his, protect them.
The Dragon on his arm shone, gold and crimson. "Once the Dragon, for remembrance lost". He held up his other arm, ending at the stump near the wrist. "Twice the Dragon . . . for the price he must pay".
"What will you do if the Seanchan leader refuses again?" Moiraine asked.
He hadn’t told her that the Empress had refused him the first time. Moiraine didn’t need to be told things. She simply discovered them.
"I don’t know", Rand said softly. "If they don’t fight, Moiraine, we will lose. If they don’t join the Dragon’s Peace, then we have nothing".
"You spent too much time on that pact", Moiraine said. "It distracted you from your goal. The Dragon does not bring peace, but destruction. You cannot change that with a piece of paper".
"We shall see", Rand said. "Thank you for your advice. Now, and always. I don’t believe I have said that enough. I owe you a debt, Moiraine".
"Well", she said. "I am still in need of a cup of tea".
Rand looked at her, incredulous. Then he laughed and walked away to bring her some.
Moiraine held her warm cup of tea, which Rand had fetched for her before leaving. He had become ruler of so much since they had parted, and he was as humble now as when she had first found him in the Two Rivers. Maybe more so.
Humble toward me, perhaps, she thought. He believes he can slay the Dark One. That is not the sign of a humble man. Rand al’Thor, such an odd mixture of self-effacement and pride. Did he finally have the balance right? Despite what she had said, his action toward her today proved he was no youth, but a man.
A man could still make mistakes. Often, they were of a more dangerous sort.
"The Wheel weaves as the Wheel wills", she murmured to herself, sipping the tea. Prepared by Rand’s hand, and not someone else’s, it was as flavorful and vibrant as it had been during better days. Not touched in the least bit by the Dark One’s shadow.
Yes, the Wheel wove as it willed. Sometimes, she wished that weaving were easier to understand.
"Everyone knows what to do?" Lan asked, turning in Mandarb’s saddle.
Andere nodded. He’d carried the word himself to the rulers, and from them it had gone to their generals and commanders. Only at the last moments had it been passed to the soldiers themselves.
There would be Darkfriends among them. There always were. It was impossible to exterminate rats from a city, no matter how many cats you brought in. The Light willing, this news would come too late for those rats to give warning to the Shadow.
"We ride", Lan said, setting heels into Mandarb’s ribs. Andere raised his banner high, the flag of Malkier, and galloped at his side. He was joined by his ranks of Malkieri. Many of those had only a little Malkieri blood in them, and were truly Borderlanders of other nations. They still chose to ride beneath his banner, and had taken up the hadori.
Thousands upon thousands of horsemen rode with him, hooves shaking the soft earth. It had been a long, hard retreat for their army. The Trollocs had superior numbers and presented a serious threat of surrounding Lan’s men. Lan’s mounted army was highly mobile, but there was only so much speed you could force upon soldiers, and Trollocs could march quickly. Faster than people could, particularly with those Fades whipping them. Fortunately, the fires in the countryside were slowing the Shadow’s army. Without that, Lan’s men might not have been able to escape.
Lan crouched in the saddle as the explosions from the Dreadlords began. To his left, the Asha’man Deepe rode, tied to his saddle because of his missing leg. As a ball of fire crackled through the air and arced down toward Lan, Deepe adopted a look of concentration and thrust his hands forward. The fire exploded in the air above them.
Burning embers fell like crimson rain, trailing smoke. One hit Mandarb's neck, and Lan brushed it aside with a gauntleted hand. The horse didn’t seem to notice.
The ground here was of deep clay. The terrain consisted of rolling hills, covered with sere grass, rocky outcrops and groves of defoliated trees. The retreat followed the banks of the Mora; the river would prevent the Trollocs flanking them from the west.
Smoke bled from two distinct points on the horizon. Fal Dara and Fal Moran. The two grandest cities in Shienar, torched by their own people, along with the lands of their farms and orchards, everything that could provide even a handful of sustenance to the invading Trollocs.
Holding the cities had not been an option. That meant they had to be destroyed.
It was time to start hitting back. Lan led a charge at the center of the mass, and the Trollocs set spears against the oncoming rush of Malkieri and Shienaran heavy cavalry. Lan brought his lance down, setting it in position along Mandarb’s neck. He leaned forward in his stirrups, holding tightly with his knees, and hoped that the channelers—Lan now had fourteen, after a small reinforcement from Egwene—could do their part.
The ground ripped up before the Trollocs. The front line of Trollocs broke.
Lan chose his target, a massive boar Trolloc that was yelling at its companions as they shied away from the explosions. Lan took the creature in the neck; the lance pierced it, and Mandarb threw the Trolloc to the side while trampling one of the cowering beasts nearby. The roar of the cavalry became a crash as the riders hit hard, letting momentum and weight carry them into the thick of the Trollocs.
Once they slowed, Lan tossed the lance to Andere, who caught it deftly. Lan’s guards moved in and he slipped his sword from its sheath. Woodsman Tops the Sapling. Apple Blossom on the Wind. The Trollocs made for easy targets when he was in the saddle—the Trollocs’ height presented their necks, shoulders and faces at just the right level.
It was quick, brutal work. Deepe watched for attacks from the enemy Dreadlords, countering them. Andere moved up to Lan’s side.
Lan’s banner was a lodestone for the Shadowspawn. They began to roar and rage, and he heard two Trolloc words spoken over and over in their language. Murdru Kar. Murdru Kar. Murdru Kar. He laid about himself with his sword, spilling their blood, coldly, within the void.
They had taken Malkier from him twice now. They would never be able to taste his sense of defeat, his sense of loss, at leaving his homeland again, this time by choice. But by the Light, he could bring them close to it. His sword through their chests would do that best.
The battle descended into chaos, as so many did. The Trollocs fell into frenzy; his army had spent the last four days not engaging the beasts at all. They had only retreated, finally having gained some control over their withdrawal, enough to avoid clashes, at least, which their fires had made possible.
Four days without a conflict, now this all-out attack. That was the first piece of the plan.
"Dai Shan!" someone called. Prince Kaisel. He pointed to where the Trollocs had managed to divide Lan’s guard. His banner was tipping.
Andere. The man’s horse fell, pulled down as Lan urged Mandarb between two Trollocs. Prince Kaisel and a handful of other soldiers joined him.
Lan couldn’t continue on horseback, lest he accidentally trample his friend. He threw himself from the saddle, hit the ground and crouched beneath a Trolloc swing. Kaisel took that beast’s leg off at the knee.
Lan dashed past the falling Trolloc. He saw his banner and a body beside it. Alive or dead, Lan did not know, but there was a Myrddraal raising a dark blade.
Lan arrived in a rush of wind and spinning steel. He blocked the Thakan’dar blade with a swing of his own, trampling his own banner as he fought. Within the void, there was no time for thought. There was only instinct and action. There was—
There was a second Myrddraal, rising up from behind Andere’s fallen horse. So, a trap. Take down the banner, draw Lan’s attention.
The two Fades attacked, one from each side. The void did not shake. A sword could not feel fear, and for that moment, Lan was the sword. The Heron Spreads Its Wings. Slashing all around him, blocking their blades with his own, back and forth. The Myrddraal were like water, flowing, but Lan was the wind itself. He spun between their blades, knocking back the attack to the right, then the one to the left.
The Fades began cursing in fury. The one to his left rushed Lan, a sneer on its pale lips. Lan stepped to the side, then parried the creature’s thrust and lopped its arm off at the elbow. He continued in a fluid stroke, his swing continuing to where he knew the other Fade would be attacking, and took its hand off at the wrist.
Both Thakan’dar blades clanged to the ground. The Fades froze, stupefied for a second. Lan cut the head of one from its neck, then twisted and drove his sword through the neck of the other. Black Pebbles on Snow. He stepped back and swiped his sword to the side to spray some of the deadly blood free of the blade. Both Fades fell, thrashing, flailing at one another, mindless, dark blood staining the ground.
A good hundred and fifty Trollocs nearby fell writhing to the ground. They’d been linked to the Fades. Lan stepped over to haul Andere out of the mud. The man looked dazed, blinking, and his arm hung at a strange angle. Lan tossed Andere over his shoulder, and kicked his banner by its staff up into his free hand.
He ran back toward Mandarb—the area around him now clear of Trollocs—and handed the banner to one of Prince Kaisel’s men. "See that cleaned, then raise it". He slung Andere across the front of his saddle, mounted, and wiped his sword on his saddle blanket. The man didn’t look mortally wounded.
He faintly heard Prince Kaisel behind. "By my fathers!" the man said. "I’d heard he was good, but . . . but Light!"
"This will do", Lan said, surveying the battlefield, releasing the void. "Send the signal, Deepe".
The Asha’man complied, sending a red streak of light into the air. Lan turned Mandarb and pointed his sword back toward the camp. His forces rallied around him. Their attack had always been meant to be a hit and retreat. They hadn’t maintained a solid battle line. That was difficult with a cavalry charge.