A Memory of Light

“You intend to keep fighting?” Androl asked, surprised.

“Yes,” Elayne said. “I can barely stand, but yes. We cannot afford to leave that Trolloc horde here intact. You and your men give us an edge, Logain. We will use it, and everything we have, and we will destroy them.”

A Tempest of Water

Egwene looked across the river at the struggle raging between her forces and the Sharan army. She had arrived back at her camp on the Arafellin side of the ford. She was itching to join the battle against the Shadow again, but she also needed to talk with Bryne about what had happened at the hil s. She had arrived to find the command tent empty.





CHAPTER


31


The camp continued to fil with Aes Sedai and the surviving archers and pikemen who were coming through gateways from the hilltops to the south. The Aes Sedai were milling about and speaking to each other with some urgency. They all seemed worn out, but it was clear from their frequent glances toward the battle taking place across the river that they were as eager as Egwene was to rejoin the fight against the Shadow.

Egwene summoned the messenger who was standing in front of the command tent. “Get word to the sisters that they have less than an hour to rest. Those Trol ocs we were fighting will be joining the battle at the river soon, now that we have left the hills., She’d move the Aes Sedai downriver on this side, then attack them across the water as they moved across the fields to attack her soldiers. “Tell the archers they’ll be marching with us as well,” she added. “They may as well put their remaining arrows to good use, until we can get them another supply.”

As the messenger rushed off, Egwene turned to Leilwin, who was standing with her husband, Bayle Domon, nearby. “Leilwin, those look like Seanchan cavalry troops across the river. Do you know anything about that?”

“Yes, Mother, they are Seanchan. That man standing over there-” She pointed to a man with shaved temples standing by a tree down toward the river; he wore voluminous trousers and, incongruously, a tattered brown coat which looked as if it might have come from the Two Rivers. “—he told me that a legion commanded by Lieutenant-General Khirgan had come from the Seanchan camp, and that they had been summoned by General Bryne.”

“He also said that they do be accompanied by the Prince of Ravens,” Domon interjected.

“Mat?”

“He did more than accompany them. He do be leading one of the cavalry banners, the ones giving the Sharans a hiding on our army’s left flank. He got there just in time, our pikemen were getting the worst of it before he showed up.”

“Egwene,” Gawyn said, pointing.

To the south, a few hundred paces below the ford, a small number of soldiers were hauling themselves from the river. They had stripped to their smal clothes and carried swords tied to their backs. It was too far to be sure, but one of their leaders looked familiar.

“Is that Uno?” Egwene frowned, then waved for her horse. She mounted and gal oped, with Gawyn and her guards, along the river to where the men lay gasping on the bank, and the sound of one man cursing filled the air.

“Uno!”

“It’s about bloody flaming time someone came!” Uno stood as he saluted in respect.

“Mother, we’re in bad shape!”

“I saw.” Egwene gritted her teeth. “I was in the hil s when your force was attacked. We did what we could, but there were just too many of them. How did you get out?”

“How did we flaming get out, Mother? When the men started dropping al around us and we figured we was goners, we flaming rode out of there like a flaming lightning bolt had struck our flaming hindquarters! We got to the frog-kissing river on the run, stripped and jumped in, swimming for all we were bloody worth, Mother, with all due respect!” Unos topknot danced as he continued to blaspheme, and Egwene could have sworn the eye painted on his eyepatch became a more intense red.

Uno took a deep breath and continued, a little more subdued. “I can’t understand it, Mother.