A Memory of Light

Bashere was accompanied by his wife and a guard of Saldaeans. Judging by the blood on her clothing, she had seen her share of fighting.

“Yes, I’m alive,” Mat said. “I’m usually pretty good at staying alive. I’ve only failed one time that I remember, and it hardly counts. What are you doing here? Aren’t you . . .”

“They dug into my bloody mind,” Bashere said, scowling. “That they did, man. Deira and I talked it over. I’m not going to lead, but why should that stop me from kil ing a few Trollocs?”

Mat nodded. At Tenobia’s fal , this man had become king of Saldaea— but he had refused the crown, so far. The corruption in his mind had shaken him. All he had said was that Saldaea fights alongside Malkier, and told the troops to look toward Lan. The throne would be sorted out if they al survived the Last Battle.

“What happened to you?” Bashere asked. “I heard the command post fel .”

Mat nodded. “The Seanchan have abandoned us.”

“Blood and ashes!” Bashere cried. “As if this weren’t bad enough. Bloody Seanchan dogs.”

The Deathwatch Guards who stood around Mat made no response to that. Elayne’s forces held along the riverbank, just barely—but Trollocs were slowly working around them upriver.

Elayne’s lines held only because of tenacity and careful training. Each huge square of men held pikes outward, bristling like a hedgehog.

Those formations could be separated if Demandred drove wedges between them in the right way. Mat employed cavalry sweeps of his own, including Andoran cavalry and the Band—trying to keep the Trol ocs from penetrating the pike squares or surrounding Elayne.

The rhythm of the battle pulsed beneath Mat’s fingertips. He felt what Demandred was doing. To anyone else, the end of the battle probably seemed a simple matter now. Attack in force, break the pike formations, crack Mat’s defenses. It was so much more subtle.

Lan’s Borderlanders had finished crushing the Trol ocs upriver, and needed orders. Good.

Mat needed those men for the next step in his plan.

Three of the enormous pike formations were flagging, but if he could place a channeler or two in each center, he could shore them up. Light shelter whoever had distracted Demandred. The Forsaken’s attacks had destroyed entire pike formations. Demandred didn’t need to kil each man individual y; he needed only to launch attacks of the One Power to shatter the square. That let the Trollocs overwhelm them.

“Bashere,” Mat said, “please tell me that someone has heard from your daughter.”

“Nobody has,” Deira said. “Fm sorry.”

Bloody ashes, Mat thought. Poor Perrin.

Poor him. How was he going to do this without the Horn? Light. He was not certain he could do it with the bloody Horn.

“Go,” Mat called as they rode. “Ride to Lan; he’s upriver. Tell him to engage those Trollocs trying to move around the Andorans’ right flank! And tell him I’ll have other orders for him coming soon.”

“But I—”

“I don’t care if you’ve bloody been touched by the Shadow!” Mat said. “Every man has had the Dark One’s fingers on his heart, and that’s the bloody truth. You can fight through it.

Now ride to Lan and tel him what needs to be done!”

Bashere stiffened at first; then—strangely—he smiled a broad smile beneath drooping mustaches. Bloody Saldaeans. They liked being yel ed at. Mat’s words seemed to give him heart, and he gal oped off, wife at his side. She threw Mat a fond look, which made him uncomfortable.

Now .. he needed an army. And a gateway. He needed a bloody gateway. Fool, he thought.

He had sent the damane away. Could he not have at least kept one? Though they did make his skin crawl as if it were covered in spiders.

Mat halted Pips, the Deathwatch Guards stopping with him. A few of them lit torches. They had certainly gotten the drubbing they had wanted, joining Mat in fighting the Sharans.

They seemed to itch for more, though.

There, Mat thought, heeling Pips toward a force of troops south of Elayne’s pike formations.

The Dragonsworn. Before the Seanchan left Dashar Knob, Mat had sent this army to reinforce Elayne’s troops.

He stil did not know what to make of them. He had not been at the Field when they had gathered, but he had heard reports. People from al ranks and stations, al nationalities, who had joined together to fight in the

Last Battle, heedless of loyalties or national borders. Rand broke all vows and all other bonds.

Mat rode at a quick trot—the Deathwatch Guards jogging to keep up—around the back of the Andoran lines. Light, the lines were buckling. This was bad. Wel , he’d made his bet. Now he could only ride the bloody battle and hope it did not buck too much.