"Rand al'Thor," Nynaeve shrieked, "that is the most outrageous thing I ever heard out of your mouth! The very idea of telling three women you love them! You're worse than a lecher! You apologize right now!" Lan had snatched his pipe from his mouth and was staring at Rand.

"I love you, Rand," Elayne said simply, "and although you haven't asked, I want to marry you." She blushed faintly, but she intended to be much more forward before very long, so she supposed this hardly counted. Nynaeve's mouth worked, but no sound came out.

"My heart is in your hands, Rand," Aviendha said, treating his name like something rare and precious. "If you make a bridal wreath for my first-sister and me, I will pick it up." And she blushed, too, trying to cover it in bending to take her shawl from the floor and arranging it on her arms. By Aiel customs, she should never had said any of that. Nynaeve finally got a sound out. A squeak.

"If you don't know by this time that I love you," Min said, "then you're blind, deaf and dead!" She certainly did not blush;

there was a mischievous light in her dark eyes, and she seemed ready to laugh. "And as for marriage, well, we'll work that out between the three of us, so there!" Nynaeve took a grip on her braid with both hands and gave it a steady pull, breathing heavily through her nose. Lan had begun an intense study of the contents of his pipe's bowl.

Rand examined the three of them as if he had never seen a woman before and wondered what they were. "You're all mad," he said finally. "I'd marry any of you—all of you, the Light help me!—but it can't be, and you know it." Nynaeve collapsed into a chair, shaking her head. She muttered to herself, though all Elayne could understand was something about the Women's Circle swallowing their tongues.

"There is something else we need to discuss," Elayne said. Light, Min and Aviendha could have been looking at a pastry! With an effort she managed to make her own smile a little less . . . eager. "In my rooms, I think. There's no need to bother Nynaeve and Lan." Or rather, she was afraid that Nynaeve would try to stop them, if she heard. The woman was very quick to use her authority when it came to Aes Sedai matters.

"Yes," Rand said slowly. And then, strangely, added, "I said you'd won, Nynaeve. I won't leave without seeing you again."

"Oh!" Nynaeve gave a start. "Yes. Of course not. I watched him grow up," she blathered, turning a sickly smile on Elayne. "Almost from the start. Watched his first steps. He can't go without a good long talk with me."

Elayne eyed her suspiciously. Light, she sounded for all the world like an aged nurse. Though Lini had never babbled. She hoped Lini was alive and well, but she was very much afraid that neither was true. Why was Nynaeve carrying on in this fashion? The woman was up to something, and if she was not going to use her standing to carry it off, it was something even she knew was wrong.

Suddenly, Rand seemed to waver, as though the air around him were shimmering with heat, and everything else flew out of Elayne's head. In an instant, he was . . . someone else, shorter and thicker, coarse and brutish. And so repulsive to look at that she did not even consider the fact that he was using the male half of the Power. Greasy black hair hung down onto an unhealthily pale face dominated by hairy warts, including one on a bulbous nose above thick slack lips that appeared on the edge of drooling. He squeezed his eyes shut and swallowed, hands gripping the arms of his chair, as if he could not stand to see them look at him.

"You are still beautiful, Rand," she said gently.

"Ha!" Min said. "That face would make a goat faint!" Well, it would, but she should not have said so.

Aviendha laughed. "You have a sense of humor, Min Farshaw. That face would make a herd of goats faint." Oh, Light, it would! Elayne swallowed a giggle just in time.

"I am who I am," Rand said, pushing himself up out of the chair. "You just won't see it."

At Deni's first sight of Rand in his disguise, the smile slid crookedly off the stocky woman's face. Caseille's mouth dropped open. So much for thoughts of secret lovers, Elayne thought, laughing to herself in amusement. She was sure he drew as many stares as the Guardswomen, shambling along between them with a sullen scowl. Certainly no one could suspect who he was. The servants in the corridors probably thought he had been apprehended in some crime. He certainly had the look. Caseille and Deni kept a hard eye on him as if they thought so, too.

The Guardswomen came near to arguing when they realized she intended them to wait outside her apartments while the three of them took him inside. Suddenly, Rand's disguise did not seem amusing at all any longer. Caseille's mouth thinned, and Deni's wide face set in stubborn displeasure. Elayne almost had to wave her Great Serpent ring beneath their noses before they took positions beside her door, scowling. She shut the door softly, cutting off the sight of their frowns, but she wanted to slam it. Light, the man could have chosen something a little less unsavory for his disguise.

And as for him, he went straight to the inlaid table, leaning against it while the air around him shimmered and he became himself once more. The Dragon's heads on the backs of his hands glittered metallically, scarlet and gold. "I need a drink," he muttered thickly, catching sight of the tall-necked silver pitcher on the long side-table against the wall.

Still not looking at her or Min or Aviendha, he walked over unsteadily and filled a silver winecup that he half-drained in one long swallow. That sweet spicy wine had been left when her breakfast was taken away. It must be cold as ice by now. She had not been expected to return to her rooms so soon, and the fire on the hearth had been banked down beneath ashes. But he made no move she could see to warm the wine by channeling. She would have seen steam, at least. And why had he walked to the wine, instead of channeling to bring it to him? That was the sort of thing he always did, floating winecups and lamps about on flows of Air.

"Are you well, Rand?" Elayne asked. "I mean, are you sick?" Her stomach tightened at the thought of what sickness it might be, with him. "Nynaeve can—"

"I am as fine as I can be," he said flatly. Still with his back to them. Emptying the cup, he began to fill it again. "Now what is it you don't want Nynaeve to hear?"

Elayne's eyebrows shot up, and she exchanged looks with Aviendha and Min. If he had seen through her subterfuge, Nynaeve certainly had. Why had she let them go? And how had he seen through it? Aviendha shook her head slightly in wonder. Min shook hers, too, but with a grin that said you just had to expect this sort of thing now and then. Elayne felt the smallest stab of—not quite jealousy; jealousy was out of the question, for them—just irritation that Min had had so much time with him and she had not. Well, if he wanted to play surprises. . . .

"We want to bond you our Warder," she said, smoothing her dress under her as she took a chair. Min sat on the edge of the table, legs dangling, and Aviendha settled onto the carpet cross-legged, carefully spreading out her heavy woolen skirts. "All three of us. It is customary to ask, first."

He spun around, wine sloshing out of his cup, more pouring from the pitcher before he could bring it upright. With a muttered oath, he hastily stepped out of the spreading wetness on the carpet and put the pitcher back on the tray. A large damp spot decorated the front of his rough coat, and droplets of dark wine that he tried to brush away with his free hand. Very satisfactory.

"You really are mad," he growled. "You know what's ahead of me. You know what it means for anyone I'm bonded to. Even if I don't go insane, she has to live through me dying! And what do you mean, all three of you? Min can't channel. Anyway, Alanna Mosvani got there ahead of you, and she didn't bother asking. She and Verin were taking some Two Rivers girls to the White Tower. I've been bonded to her for months, now."