Even at this hour, with the moon low in the west, there were a few people out on the wooden walkways, serving women and workmen scurrying about late tasks. Or perhaps early would be a better word now. Most of the tents, in nearly every size and shape imaginable, were dark, but a number of the larger ones glowed with the light of lamps or candles. Unsurprising under the circumstances. Every lit tent had men around it, or gathered in front. Warders. No one else could stand so still they seemed to fade into the night, especially not in this icy night. With the Power filling her, she could make out others, their Warders’ cloaks making them vanish in the shadows. Between the murdered sisters and what their bonds to their Aes Sedai must be carrying to them, not surprising at all. She suspected more than one sister was ready to tear her own hair, or someone else’s. They took note of her, heads swiveling to follow her passage as she rode slowly along the frozen ruts, searching.
The Hall had to be informed, of course, but others needed to hear first. In her estimation, they were much more likely to do something… precipitate. And quite possibly disastrous. Oaths held them, but oaths given under duress, to a woman they now believed dead. For the Hall, for most of the Hall, they had nailed their flag to the mast in accepting a seat. None oithem would be jumping until they were very, very sure where they would land.
Sheriam’s tent was too small for what she was sure she would find, and dark besides, she noted in passing. She very much doubted the woman was asleep inside, though. Morvrin’s, big enough to sleep four comfortably, would have done if there was room among all the books the Brown had managed to acquire on the march, but that was dark as well. Her third choice provided a catch, though, and she reined in Nightlily well short of it.
Myrelle had two peaked tents in the camp, one for herself and one for her three Warders-the three she dared acknowledge-and her own shone brightly, the shadows of women moving on the patched canvas walls. Three dissimilar men stood on the walkway in front of the tent-their stillness marked them Warders-but she ignored them for the moment. What exactly were they talking about inside? Certain that it was useless effort, she wove Air with just a hint of Fire; her weave touched the tent and struck a barrier against eavesdropping. Inverted, of course, and so invisible to her. She had only made the attempt on the chance they were being careless. Small possibility of that with the secrets they had to hide. The shadows against the canvas were still, now. So they knew someone had tried. She rode the rest of the way wondering what they had been talking about.
As she dismounted-well, at least she managed to turn half-falling off into something akin to jumping down-one of the Warders, Sheriam’s Arinvar, a lean Cairhienin little taller than she, stepped forward to reach for the reins with a small bow, but she waved him away. Releasing saidar, she tied the mare to one of the wooden slats of the walkway using a knot that would have held a sizable boat against heavy wind and a strong current. None of those casual loops that others used, not for her. She might dislike riding, but when she tied a horse, she wanted it there when she came back. Arinvar’s eyebrows climbed as he watched her finish the knot, but he would not be the one who had to pay for the bloody animal if it got loose and lost itself.
Only one of the other two Warders belonged to Myrelle, Avar Hachami, a Saldaean with a nose like an eagle’s beak and thick, gray-streaked mustaches. After sparing her one glance and a slight inclination of his head, he returned to watching the night. Morvrin’s Jori, short and bald and nearly as wide as he was tall, did not acknowledge her at all. His eyes studied the darkness, and his hand rested lightly on his long sword hilt. Supposedly he was among the best of the Warders with a blade. Where were the others? She could not ask, of course, any more than she could ask who was within. The men would have been shocked to their bones. None of them tried to stop her from entering. At least matters had not gotten that bad.
Inside, where two braziers gave off the scent of roses and made the air almost toasty compared to the night, she found almost everyone she had hoped for, and all watching to see who entered.
Myrelle herself, sitting on a sturdy straight-chair in a silk robe covered with red and yellow flowers, her arms folded beneath her breasts, wore such a perfect expression of calm on her olive face that it only pointed up the heat in her dark eyes. The light of the Power shone around her. It was her tent, after all; she would be the one to weave a ward here. Sheriam, seated on one end of Myrelle’s cot with a straight back, pretended to be adjusting her blue-slashed skirts; her expression was as fiery as her hair, and it grew hotter when she saw Siuan. She was not wearing the Keeper’s stole, a bad sign.
“I might have expected it would be you,” Carlinya said coldly, fists on her hips. She was never a warm woman, but now the ringlets that stopped well short of her shoulders framed a face that seemed carved from ice nearly as pale as her dress. “I will not have you trying to listen in on my private conversations, Siuan.” Oh, yes; they thought everything was at an end.
Round-faced Morvrin, for once not appearing at all absentminded or sleepy-eyed despite the creases in her brown wool skirt, walked around the small table where a tall silver pitcher and five silver cups sat on a lacquered tray. It seemed no one felt like tea; the cups were all dry. Dipping into her belt pouch, the graying sister thrust a carved horn comb into Siuan’s hand. “You are all windblown, woman. Fix your hair before some lout takes you for a tavern trull instead of an Aes Sedai and tries to dandle you on his knee.”
“Egwene and Leane are alive and prisoners inside the Tower,” Siuan announced, more calmly than she felt. A tavern trull? Touching her hair, she discovered that the other woman was right and began working the comb through the tangles. If you wanted to be taken seriously, you could not look as though you had been tussling in an alley. She had enough difficulty with that as it was, now, and would have until some years after she could lay hands on the Oath Rod again. “Egwene spoke to me in my dreams. They succeeded in blocking the harbors, near enough, but they were captured. Where are Beonin and Nisao? One of you go fetch them. I don’t want to scale the same fish twice.”
There. If they thought themselves free of their oaths, and free of Eg-wene’s orders to obey her, that should disabuse them. Except that no one moved to obey.
“Beonin wanted her bed,” Morvrin said slowly, studying Siuan. A very intense study. A sharp mind hid behind that placid face. “She was too tired to talk any more. And why would we have asked Nisao to join us?” That earned a small frown from Myrelle, who was Nisao’s friend, but the other two nodded agreement. They and Beonin thought of Nisao as apart from themselves in spite of the oaths of fealty they shared. In Siuan’s opinion, these women had never stopped believing they might still guide events somehow, even after the rudder had long since been taken from their hands.
Sheriam rose from the cot as though about to rush off, even gathering her skirts, but that had nothing to do with Siuan’s command. Anger had vanished, replaced by shining eagerness. “We dont need them for the moment in any case. ‘Prisoners’ means the deep cells until the Hall convenes for a trial. We can Travel there and free them before Elaida knows what is happening.”
Myrelle gave a sharp nod and stood, reaching to undo the sash of her robe. “Best if we leave the Warders behind, I think. They won’t be needed in this.” She drew more deeply on the Source, already anticipating.
“No!” Siuan said sharply, and winced as the comb caught in her hair. Sometimes she thought of cutting it shorter than Carlinya’s, for convenience, but Gareth had complimented her, saying how much he liked the way it brushed her shoulders. Light, could she not escape the man even here? “Egwene isn’t to be tried, and she isn’t in the deep cells. She wouldn’t tell me where she is being held except to say that she is guarded constantly. And she orders that there be no attempt to rescue her that involves sisters.”