A Memory of Light

No. There was a quiet to the camps, true, but it was not the quiet of slumber. It was the quiet of ships waiting for the right winds.

She knew little of what was happening here—she hadn’t dared open her mouth in Tar Valon to ask questions, lest her accent reveal her as Seanchan. A gathering of this size did not occur without dedicated planning. She was surprised at the immensity of it; she’d heard of the meeting here, one that most of the Aes Sedai had come to attend. This exceeded anything she’d anticipated.

She started across the field, and Bayle fol owed, both of them joining the group of Tar Valon servants they had been al owed to accompany, thanks to Bayle’s bribe. His methods did not please her, but she had been able to think of no other way. She tried not to think too much about his original contacts in Tar Valon. Well, if she was never to be on a ship again, then Bayle would find no more opportunities for smuggling. That was a small comfort.

You’re a ship’s captain. That’s all you know, all you want. And now, Ship less. She shivered, and clenched her hands into fists to keep from wrapping her arms around herself. To spend the rest of her days on these unchanging lands, never able to move at a pace brisker than what a horse could provide, never to smell the deep-sea air, never to point her prow toward a horizon, hoist anchor, set sail and simply . . .

She shook herself. Find Nynaeve and Elayne. She might be Shipless, but she would not let herself slip into the depths and drown. She set her course and started walking. Bayle hunched down slightly, suspicious, and tried to watch all around them at once. He also glanced at her a few times, lips drawn to a line. She knew what that meant, by now.

“What is it?” she asked.

“Leilwin, what do we be doing here?”

“I’ve told you. We need to find—”

“Yes, but why? What do you think you wil do? They do be Aes Sedai.”

“They showed me respect before.”

“And so you do think they’l take us in?”

“Perhaps.” She eyed him. “Speak it, Bayle. You have something on your He sighed. “Why do we need be taken in, Leilwin.' We could find ourselves a ship somewhere, in Arad Doman. Where there do be no Aes Sedai or Seanchan.”

“I wouldn’t run the kind of ship you prefer.

He regarded her flatly. “I do know how to run an honest business, Leilwin. It would no be—’

She raised a hand, quieting him, then rested it on his shoulder. They stopped on the pathway. “I know, my love. I know. I’m speaking words to distract, to set us spinning in a current that goes nowhere.

“Why?” . , , .,

That single word scratched at her like a splinter under a ngernai .

Whv> Why had she come all this way, traveling with Matrim Cauthon, putting herself dangerously near the Daughter of the Nine Moons? My people live with a grave misconception of the world, Bayle. In doing so, t ey create injustice.” ,

“They did reject you, Leilwin,” he said softly. You do no longer e 0ft^ll always be one of them. My name was revoked, but not my blood.”

“I do be sorry for the insult.”

She nodded curtly. “I am stil loyal to the Empress, may she hve forever. But the damane . . .

they are the very foundation for her rule. They are t e means by which she creates order, by which she holds the Empire together.

And the damane are a lie.” f Suldam could channel. The talent could be learned. Now, months after she had discovered the truth, her mind could not encompass al of the implications. Another might have been more interested in the political advantage; another might have returned to Seanchan and used this to gain power.

Almost, Leilwin wished she had done that. Almost.

But the pleas of the suldam . . . growing to know those Aes Sedai, who were nothing like what she’d been taught ..

Something had to be done. And yet, in doing it, did she risk causing the entire Empire to collapse? Her movements must be considered very,

very carefully, like the last rounds of a game of shal.

The two continued to fol ow the line of servants in the dark; one Aes Sedai or another often sent servants for something they d left in the White Tower, so traveling back and forth was common—a good thing for Leilwin. They passed the perimeter of the Aes Sedai camp without being challenged.

She was surprised at the ease of it until she spotted several men alongside the path. They were very easy to miss; something about them blended into the surroundings, particularly in the darkness. She noticed them only when one moved, breaking off from the others to fal into step a short distance behind her and Bayle.

In seconds, it was obvious that he’d picked the two of them out. Perhaps it was the way they walked, the way they held themselves. They’d been careful to dress plainly, though Bayle’s beard would mark him as II-lianer.