Egwene wanted to ask about Rand and the kidnapping- kidnapping?-but Lirene left no opening as she went on about Elaida’s many mistakes, all the while pacing back and forth, her eyes darting and her hands twisting unconsciously. Egwene was unsure whether or not that session could be called a success, but at least it was not a failure. And she had learned something.

Not all of her forays went so well, of course.

“This is not a discussion,” Pritalle Nerbaijan said. Her tone was utterly calm, yet her tilted green eyes were heated. Her rooms looked more those of a Green than a Yellow, with several bared swords hanging on the walls and a silk tapestry showing men fighting Trollocs. She was gripping the hilt of the dagger at her woven silver belt. Not a simple belt knife; a dagger with a blade near a foot long and an emerald capping its pommel. Why she had agreed to lecture Egvvene was a mystery, given her dislike of teaching. Perhaps because it was Egwene. “You are here for a lesson on the limits of power. A very basic lesson, suitable for a novice.”

Egwene wanted to shift on the three-legged stool that Pritalle had given her for a seat, but instead she concentrated on the smarting, focused on drinking it in. On welcoming it. The day had already seen three visits to Silviana, and she could sense a fourth coming, with the midday meal an hour off yet. “I merely said that if Shemerin could be reduced from Aes Sedai to Accepted then Elaida’s power has no limits. At least, she thinks it doesn’t. But if you accept that, then it really doesn’t.”

Pritalle’s grip tightened on the dagger’s hilt until her knuckles showed white, yet she seemed unaware. “Since you think you know better than I,” she said coolly, “you can visit Silviana when we finish.” A partial success, perhaps. Egwene did not think Pritalle’s anger was for her.

“I expect proper behavior out of you,” Serancha Colvine told her firmly another day. The word to describe the Gray sister was “pinched.” A pinched mouth, and a pinched nose that constantly seemed to be detecting a bad smell. Even her pale blue eyes seemed pinched with disapproval. She might well have been pretty otherwise. “Do you understand?”

“I understand,” Egwene said, sitting down on the stool that had been placed in front of Serancha’s high-backed chair. The morning was cool, and a small fire burned on the stone hearth. Drink in the pain. Welcome the pain.

“An incorrect response,” Serancha said. “The correct response would have been a curtsy and ‘I understand. Serancha Sedai.’ I intend to make a list of your failures for you to carry to Silviana when we’re done. We’ll begin again. Do you understand, child?”

“I understand.” Egwene said without rising. Aes Sedai serenity or no Aes Sedai serenity, Serancha’s face turned purple. In the end, her list covered four pages in a tight, cramped hand. She spent more time writing than she did lecturing! Not a success.

And then there was Adelorna Bastine. The Saldaean Green somehow managed stateliness in spite of being slim and no taller than Egwene, and she had a regal, commanding air that might have been intimidating had Egwene let it. “I hear you make trouble.” she said, picking up an ivory-backed hairbrush from a small inlaid table beside her chair. “If you try to make trouble with me, you’ll learn that I know how to use this.”

Egwene did learn, without trying. Three times she went across Adelorna’s lap, and the woman did indeed know how to use a hairbrush for more than brushing her hair. That managed to stretch an hour lecture to two.

“May I go now?” Egwene said at last, calmly drying her cheeks as well as she could with a handkerchief that was already damp. Breathe in the pain. Absorb the fire. “I’m supposed to fetch water up for the Red, and I don’t want to be late.”

Adelorna frowned at her hairbrush before returning it to the table that Egwene had overset twice with her kicking. Then she frowned at Egwene, studying her as if trying to see inside her skull. “I wish Cadsuane were in the Tower,” she murmured. “I think she’d find you a challenge.” There seemed a touch of respect in her voice.

That day was a turning point in some ways. For one thing, Silviana decided that Egwene was to receive Healing twice each day.

“You seem to invite being beaten, child. It’s pure stubbornness, and I won’t put up with it. You will face reality. The next time you visit me, we’ll see how you like the strap.” The Mistress of Novices folded Egwene’s shift over her back, then paused. “Are you smiling} Did I say something amusing?”

“I just thought of something funny.” Egwene said. “Nothing of consequence.” Not of consequence to Silviana, anyway. She had realized how to welcome the pain. She was fighting a war, not a single battle, and every time she was beaten, every time she was sent to Silviana. it was a sign that she had fought another battle and refused to yield. The pain was a badge of honor. She howled and kicked as hard as ever during that slippering, but while she was drying her cheeks afterward, she hummed quietly to herself. It was easy to welcome a badge of honor.

Attitudes among the novices began to shift by the second day of her captivity. It seemed that Nicola-and Areina. who was working in the stables and often came to visit Nicola; they seemed so close that Egwene wondered whether they had become pillow-friends, always with their heads together and smiling mysterious smiles- Nicola and Areina had regaled them all with tales of her. Very inflated tales. The two women had made her seem a combination of every legendary sister in the histories, along with Birgitte Silverbow and Amaresu herself, carrying the Sword of the Sun into battle. Half of them seemed in awe of her, the others angry with her for some reason or outright scornful. Foolishly, some tried to emulate her behavior in their classes, but a flurry of visits to Silviana quelled that. At the midday meal of the third day, nearly two dozen novices ate standing up and red-faced with embarrassment, Nicola among them. And Alvis-tere. surprisingly. That number dropped to seven at supper, and on the fourth day, only Nicola and the Cairhienin girl did so. And that was the end of that.

She expected some might resent the fact that she continued to refuse to bend while they had been put back on the straight and narrow so quickly, but to the contrary, it only seemed to decrease the number who were angry or scornful and increase the respect. No one tried to become her friend, which was just as well. White dress or no white dress, she was Aes Sedai, and it was improper for an Aes Sedai to befriend a novice. There was too much risk the girl would start feeling above herself and get into trouble for it. Novices began coming to her for advice, for help learning their lessons, though. Only a handful at first, but the number grew day by day. She was willing to help them learn, which was usually just a matter of strengthening a girl’s confidence or convincing a young woman that caution was wise, or taking them patiently through the steps of a weave that was giving trouble. Novices were forbidden to channel without an Aes Sedai or Accepted present, though they nearly always did in secret anyway, but she was a sister. She refused to help more than one at a time, however. Word of groups would surely leak out, and she would not be the only one sent to Silviana. She would make that trip as often as necessary, but she did not want to earn it for others. And as for advice… With the novices kept strictly clear of men, advice was easy. Though strains between pillow-friends could be as harsh as anything men ever caused.

One evening, returning from yet another session with Silviana, she overheard Nicola talking to two novices who could not have been more than fifteen or sixteen. Egwene hardly remembered being that young. It seemed a lifetime ago. Marah was a stocky Murandian with mischievous blue eyes, Namene a tall, slim Domani who giggled incessantly.