Among the Wise Ones

Among the Wise Ones

Standing as close as she could to the small fire in the middle of the tent, Egwene still shivered as she poured water from the generous teakettle into a wide, blue-striped bowl. She had lowered the sides of the tent, but cold seeped through the colorful layered rugs covering the ground, and all the fire's heat seemed to rush up and out of the smoke hole in the middle of the tent roof, leaving only the smell of the burning cow dung. Her teeth wanted to chatter.

Already the steam from the water was beginning to fade; she embraced saidar for a moment and channeled Fire to heat it more. Amys or Bair would probably have washed in it cold, though in fact they always took sweat baths. So I'm not as tough as they are. I did not grow up in the Waste. I don't have to freeze to death and wash in cold water if I don't want to. She still felt guilty as she lathered a cloth with a piece of lavender-scented soap bought from Hadnan Kadere. The Wise Ones had never asked her to do differently, but it still felt like cheating.

Letting go of the True Source made her sigh with remorse. Even trembling with cold, she laughed softly at her own foolishness. The wonder of being filled with the Power, the wondrous rush of life and awareness, was its own danger. The more you drew on saidar, the more you wanted to draw, and without self-discipline you eventually drew more than you could handle and either died or stilled yourself. And that was nothing to laugh at.

That's one of your biggest faults, she lectured herself firmly. You always want to do more than you're supposed to. You ought to wash in cold water; that would teach you self-discipline. Only there was so much to learn, and it sometimes seemed a lifetime would be too short to learn it. Her teachers were always so cautious, whether Wise Ones or Aes Sedai in the Tower; it was hard to hold back when she knew that in so many ways she already outstripped them. I can do more than they realize.

A blast of freezing air hit her, swirling smoke from the fire about the tent, and a woman's voice said, "If it please 16316y247q s you -"

Egwene jumped, yelping shrilly before managing to get out, "Shut that!" She hugged herself to stop from capering. "Get in or get out, but shut it!" All that effort to be warm, and now she was icy goose bumps from head to toe!

The white-robed woman shuffled into the tent on her knees and let the tent flap drop. She kept her eyes downcast, her hands folded meekly; she would have done the same if Egwene had hit her instead of just shouting. "If it pleases you," she said softly, "the Wise One Amys sent me to bring you to the sweat tent."

Wishing she could stand on top of the fire, Egwene groaned. The Light burn Bair and her stubbornness! If not for the white-haired old Wise One, they could be in rooms in the city instead of tents on the edge of it. I could have a room with a proper fireplace. And a door. She was willing to bet that Rand did not have to put up with people wandering in on him whenever they wanted. Rand bloody Dragon al'Thor snaps his fingers, and the Maidens jump like serving girls. I'll wager they've found him a real bed, instead of a pallet on the ground. She was sure that he got a hot bath every night. The Maidens probably haul buckets of hot water up to his rooms. I'll bet they even found him a proper copper bathtub.

Amys, and even Melaine, had been amenable to Egwene's suggestion, but Bair had put her foot down, and they acquiesced like gai'shain. Egwene supposed that with Rand bringing so much change, Bair wanted to hold on to as much of the old ways as she could, but she wished the woman could have chosen something else to be intractable over.

There was no thought of refusing. She had promised the Wise Ones to forget that she was Aes Sedai - the easy part, since she was not - and do exactly as she was told. That was the hard part; she had been away from the Tower long enough to become her own mistress again. But Amys had told her flatly that dreamwalking was dangerous even after you knew what you were about and far more so until then. If she would not obey in the waking world, they could not trust her to obey in the dream, and they would not take the responsibility. So she did chores right along with Aviendha, accepted chastisement with as good a grace as she could muster, and hopped whenever Amys or Melaine or Bair said frog. In a manner of speaking. None of them had ever seen a frog. Not that they'll want anything but for me to hand them their tea. No, it would be Aviendha's turn to do that tonight.

For a moment she considered donning stockings, but finally just bent to slip on her shoes. Sturdy shoes, suitable for the Waste; she rather regretted the silk slippers she had worn in Tear. "What is your name?" she asked, trying to be companionable.

"Cowinde" was the docile reply.Egwene sighed. She kept trying to be friends with the gai'shain, but they never responded. Servants were one thing she had not had a chance to get used to, though of course gai'shain were not precisely servants. "You were a Maiden?"A quick, fierce flash of deep blue eyes told her that her guess was correct, but just as quickly they lowered again. "I am gai'shain. Before and after are not now, and only now exists."

"What is your sept and clan?" Usually there was no need to ask, not even with gai'shain.

"I serve the Wise One Melaine of the Jhirad sept, of the Goshien Aiel."

Trying to choose between two cloaks, a stout brown woolen and a blue quilted silk she had purchased from Kadere - the merchant had sold everything in his wagons to make room for Moiraine's freight, and at very good prices - Egwene paused to frown at the woman. That was no proper response. She had heard that a form of the bleakness had taken some gai'shain; when their year and a day was done, they simply refused to put off the robe. "When is your time up?" she asked.

Cowinde crouched lower, almost huddling over her knees. "I am gai'shain."

"But when will you be able to return to your sept, to your own hold?"

"I am gai'shain," the woman hoarsely told the rugs in front of her face. "If the answer displeases, punish me, but I can give no other."

"Don't be silly," Egwene said sharply. "And straighten up. You aren't a toad."

The white-robed woman obeyed immediately and, sat there on her heels, submissively awaiting another command. That brief flare of spirit might as well never have been.

Egwene took a deep breath. The woman had made her own accommodation with the bleakness. A foolish one, but nothing she could say would change it. Anyway, she was supposed to be on her way to the sweat tent, not talking with Cowinde.

Remembering that cold draft, she hesitated. The icy gust had made two large white blossoms, resting in a shallow bowl, curl partway closed. They came from a plant called a segade, a fat, leafless, leathery thing that bristled with spines. She had come on Aviendha looking at them in her hands that morning; the Aiel woman had given a start when she saw her, then pushed them into Egwene's hands, saying she had picked them for her. She supposed there was enough of the Maiden left in Aviendha that she did not want to admit liking flowers. Though come to think of it, she had seen the occasional Maiden wearing a blossom in her hair or on her coat.

You are just trying to put it off, Egwene al'Vere. Now stop being a silly wool-head. You are being as foolish as Cowinde. "Lead the way," she said, and just had time to swing the woolen cloak around her nakedness before the woman swept open the tent flap for her, and for the bone-chilling night.

Overhead, the stars were crisp points in the darkness, and the three-quarter moon was bright. The Wise Ones' camp was a cluster of two dozen low mounds, not a hundred paces from where one of Rhuidean's paved streets ended in hard, cracked clay and stones. Moonshadows turned the city into strange cliffs and crags. Every tent had its flaps down, and the smells of fires and cooking blended to fill the air.

The other Wise Ones came here for almost daily gatherings, but they spent nights with their own septs. Several even slept in Rhuidean now. But not Bair. This was as close to the city as Bair had been willing to come; if Rand had not been there, doubtless she would have insisted on making camp in the mountains.

Egwene held the cloak tight with both hands and walked as fast as she could. Icy tendrils curled under the cloak's bottom, swept in every time her bare legs kicked a gap open. Cowinde had to pull her white robes to her knees in order to keep ahead. Egwene did not need the gai'shain's guidance, but since the woman had been sent to bring her, she would be shamed and maybe offended if not allowed to. Clenching her teeth to keep them from chattering, Egwene wished the woman would run.

The sweat tent looked like any other, low and wide, with the flaps lowered all around, except that the smoke hole had been covered. Nearby a fire had burned down to glowing embers scattered over a few rocks the size of a man's head. There was not enough light to define the much smaller shadowed mound beside the tent entrance, but she knew it was neatly folded women's clothes.

Taking one deep, chilling breath, she hurriedly scuffed off her shoes, let her cloak drop, and all but dove into the tent. An instant of shuddering cold before the flap fell shut behind her, then steamy heat clamped down, squeezing out sweat that covered her in an instant sheen while she was still gasping and shaking.

The three Wise Ones who were teaching her about dreamwalking sat sweating unconcernedly, their waist-length hair hanging damply. Bair was talking to Melaine, whose green-eyed beauty and red-gold hair made a sharp contrast to the older woman's leathery face and long white tresses. Amys was white-haired, too - or perhaps it was just so pale a yellow that it seemed white - but she did not look old. She and Melaine could both channel - not many Wise Ones could - and she had something of the Aes Sedai look of agelessness about her. Moiraine, seeming slight and small beside the others, also looked unruffled, although sweat rolled down her pale nudity and slicked her dark hair to her scalp, with a regal refusal to acknowledge that she had no clothes on. The Wise Ones were using slim, curved pieces of bronze, called staera, to scrape off sweat and the day's dirt.

Aviendha was squatting sweatily beside the big black kettle of hot, sooty rocks in the middle of the tent, carefully using a pair of tongs to move a last stone from a smaller kettle to the larger. That done, she sprinkled water onto the rocks from a gourd, adding to the steam. If she let the steam fall too far, she would be spoken to sharply at the very least. The next time the Wise Ones met in the sweat tent, it would be Egwene's turn to tend the rocks.

Egwene cautiously sat down cross-legged next to Bair - instead of layered rugs, there was only rocky ground, unpleasantly hot, lumpy and damp - and realized with a shock that Aviendha had been switched, and recently. When the Aiel woman gingerly took her own place, beside Egwene, she did so with a face as stony as the ground, but a face that could not hide her flinch.

This was something Egwene did not expect; The Wise Ones exacted a hard discipline - harder even than the Tower, which took some doing - but Aviendha worked at learning to channel with a grim determination. She could not dreamwalk, but she surely put as much effort into absorbing every art of a Wise One as she could ever have put into learning her weapons as a Maiden. Of course, after she confessed to letting Rand know about the Wise Ones watching his dreams, they had made her spend three days digging shoulder-deep holes and filling them in again, but that was one of the few times Aviendha had ever seemed to put a foot wrong. Amys and the other two had held her up to Egwene so often as a model of meek obedience and proper fortitude that sometimes Egwene wanted to shriek, even if Aviendha was a friend.

"You took long enough in coming," Bair said grumpily, while Egwene was still gingerly searching for a comfortable seat. Her voice was thin and reedy, but a reed of iron. She continued to scrape her arms with a staera.

"I am sorry," Egwene said. There; that should be meek enough.

Bair sniffed. "You are Aes Sedai beyond the Dragonwall, but here you are yet a pupil, and a pupil does not dally. When I send for Aviendha, or send her for something, she runs, even if all I want is a pin. You could do much worse than to pattern yourself after her."

Flushing, Egwene tried to make her voice humble. "I will try, Bair." This was the first time a Wise One had made the comparison in front of others. She sneaked a glance at Aviendha and was surprised to find her looking thoughtful. Sometimes she wished her "near-sister" were not always such a good example.

"The girl will learn, Bair, or she will not," Melaine said irritably. "Instruct her in promptness later, if she still needs it." No more than ten or twelve years older than Aviendha, she usually sounded as if she had a burr under her skirts. Maybe she was sitting on a sharp rock. She would not move if she was; she would expect the rock to move. "I tell you again, Moiraine Sedai, the Aiel follow He Who Comes With the Dawn, not the White Tower."

Obviously, Egwene was meant to pick up what they were talking about as they went on.

"It may be," Amys said in a level voice, "that the Aiel will serve the Aes Sedai again, but that time has not come yet, Moiraine Sedai." Her scraping barely paused as she eyed the Aes Sedai calmly.

It would come, Egwene knew, now that Moiraine was aware that some of the Wise Ones could channel. Aes Sedai would be journeying into the Waste to find girls who could be taught, and would almost certainly be trying to take any Wise One with the ability back to the Tower, too. Once she had worried about the Wise Ones being browbeaten and dominated, hauled away whenever they wanted; Aes Sedai never let any woman who could channel run free of the Tower for long. She did not worry anymore, though the Wise Ones themselves seemed to. Amys and Melaine could match any Aes Sedai will for will, as they showed every day with Moiraine. Bair could very likely make even Siuan Sanche jump through hoops, and Bair could not even channel.

For that matter, Bair was not the strongest-willed Wise One. That honor went to an even older woman; Sorilea, of the Jarra sept of the Chareen Aiel. The Wise One of Shende Hold could channel less than most novices, but she was as likely to send another Wise One on an errand as a gai'shain. And they went. No, there was no reason to distress herself over Wise Ones being bullied.

"It is understandable that you wish to spare your lands," Bair put in, "but Rand al'Thor obviously does not mean to lead us to punish. No one who submits to He Who Comes With the Dawn, and the Aiel, will be harmed." So that was it. Of course.

"It is not only sparing lives or lands that concerns me." Moiraine made wiping sweat from her brow with one finger into a queenly gesture, but her voice sounded nearly as tight as Melaine's. "If you allow this, it will be disastrous. Years of planning are coming to fruition, and he means to ruin it all."

"Plans of the White Tower," Amys said, so smoothly she might have been agreeing. "Those plans have nothing to do with us. We, and the other Wise Ones, must consider what is right for the Aiel. We will see that the Aiel do what is best for the Aiel."

Egwene wondered what the clan chiefs would say about that. Of course, they frequently complained that the Wise Ones meddled in matters that were not theirs, so perhaps it would not come as a surprise. The chiefs all seemed to be hard-willed, intelligent men, but she believed they had as much chance against the combined Wise Ones as the Village Council back home did against the Women's Circle.

This time, though, Moiraine was right.

"If Rand -" she began, but Bair stepped on her firmly.

"We will hear what you have to say later, girl. Your knowledge of Rand al'Thor is valuable, but you will hold your peace and listen until you are bidden to speak. And stop looking sullen, or I will dose you with bluespine tea."

Egwene grimaced. Respect for the Aes Sedai, though a respect between equals, included but little for the pupil, even one they believed was Aes Sedai. She kept her tongue still, in any case. Bair was capable of sending her to fetch her herb pouches and telling her to brew the incredibly bitter tea herself; it had no purpose at all except to cure sullenness or sulkiness or whatever else a Wise One might find disfavor with, which it did by taste alone. Aviendha gave her a comforting pat on the arm.

"You believe it will not be a catastrophe for the Aiel as well?" It must have been difficult to sound as cool as a winter stream when you glistened from head to foot with condensed steam and your own sweat, but Moiraine apparently had no difficulty. "It will be the Aiel War all over again. You will kill and burn and loot towns as you did then, until you have turned every man and woman against you."

"The fifth is our due, Aes Sedai," Melaine said, throwing her long hair back over her shoulder so she could work a staera across a smooth shoulder. Even heavy and damp with the steam, her hair glistened like silk. "We took no more even from the treekillers." Her glance at Moiraine was too bland not to be significant; they knew she was Cairhienin. "Your kings and queens take as much in their taxes."

"And when the nations turn against you?" Moiraine persisted. "In the Aiel War, the nations united turned you back. That can and will happen again, with great loss of life on both sides."

"None of us fears death, Aes Sedai," Amys told her, smiling gently as if explaining something to a child. "Life is a dream from which we all must wake before we can dream again. Besides, only four clans crossed the Dragonwall under Janduin. Six are here already, and you say Rand al'Thor means to take all of the clans."

"The Prophecy of Rhuidean says he will break us." The spark in Melaine's green eyes could have been for Moiraine or because she was not as resigned as she sounded. "What does it matter whether it is here or beyond the Dragonwall?"

"You will lose him the support of every nation west of the Dragonwall," Moiraine said. She looked as calm as ever, but an edge in her voice said she was ready to chew rocks. "He must have their support!"

"He has the support of the Aiel nation," Bair told her in that fragile, unyielding voice. She emphasized her words by gesturing with the slim metal blade. "The clans have never been a nation, but now he makes us one."

"We will not help you turn him in this, Moiraine Sedai," Amys added just as firmly.

"You may leave us now, Aes Sedai, if it pleases you," Bair said. "We have discussed what you wished to discuss as much as we will tonight." It was politely said, but a dismissal all the same.

"I will leave you," Moiraine replied, once again all serenity. She sounded as though it were her suggestion, her decision. By this time she was used to the Wise Ones making it clear they were not under the Tower's authority. "I have other matters to see to."

That much had to be the truth, of course. Very likely something concerning Rand. Egwene knew better than to ask; if Moiraine wanted her to know, she would tell her, and if not... If not, she would be handed some slippery bit of Aes Sedai avoidance of a lie, or else be told bluntly that it was none of her business. Moiraine knew that "Egwene Sedai of the Green Ajah" was a fraud. She tolerated the lie in public, but otherwise she let Egwene know her proper place whenever it suited her.

As soon as Moiraine had gone, in a burst of cold air, Amys said, "Aviendha, pour the tea."

The young Aiel woman gave a startled jerk, and her mouth opened twice before she said faintly, "I must brew it yet." With that she scurried out of the tent on all fours. The second blast from outside dimmed the steam.

The Wise Ones exchanged looks that were almost as surprised as Aviendha's. And Egwene's; Aviendha always did even the most onerous chores efficiently, if not always with a good grace. Something must be troubling her greatly, to make her forget a thing like making tea. The Wise Ones always wanted tea.

"More steam, girl," Melaine said.

That was her, Egwene realized, with Aviendha gone. Hurriedly splashing more water on the rocks, she channeled to heat the stones further, and the kettle, until she heard stones cracking and the kettle itself radiated heat like a furnace. The Aiel might be used to leaping from roasting in their own juices to freezing, but she was not. Hot, thick clouds rolled up to fill the tent. Amys nodded approvingly; she and Melaine could see the glow of saidar surrounding her, of course, though she herself could not. Melaine merely went on scraping with her staera.

Letting go of the True Source, she sat back and leaned close to Bair to whisper, "Has Aviendha done something very wrong?" She did not know how Aviendha would feel about it, but she saw no reason to embarrass her, even behind her back.

Bair had no such compunctions. "You mean her stripes?" she said in a normal voice. "She came to me and said she had lied twice today, though she would not say to whom or about what. It was her own affair, of course, so long as she did not lie to a Wise One, but she claimed her honor required that a toh must be met."

"She asked you to..." Egwene gasped, but could not finish.

Bair nodded as if it were not very much out of the ordinary at all. "I gave her a few extra for troubling me with it. If ji was involved, her obligation is not to me. Very likely her so-called lies were nothing anyone but a Far Dareis Mai would worry about. Maidens, even former Maidens, are sometimes as fussy as men." Amys gave her a flat look that was plain even in the thick steam. Like Aviendha, Amys had been Far Dareis Mai before becoming a Wise One.

Egwene had never met an Aiel who was not fussy about ji'e'toh, the way she saw it. But this! Aiel were all mad as loons.

Apparently, Bair had already put the matter out of her mind. "There are more Lost Ones in the Three-fold Land than I can ever remember before," she said to the tent at large. That was what the Aiel had always called the Tinkers, the Tuatha'an.

"They flee the troubles beyond the Dragonwall." The sneer in Melaine's voice was clear.

"I have heard," Amys said slowly, "that some of those who run after the bleakness have gone to the Lost Ones and asked to be taken in." A long silence followed. They knew now that the Tuatha'an had the same descent as themselves, that they had broken away before the Aiel crossed the Spine of the World into the Waste, but if anything the knowledge had only deepened their aversion.

"He brings change," Melaine whispered harshly into the steam.

"I thought you were reconciled to the changes he brings," Egwene said, sympathy welling up in her voice. It must be very hard to have your whole life stood on end. She half-expected to be told to hold her tongue again, but no one did.

"Reconciled," Bair said, as though tasting the word. "Better to say we endure them, as best we can."

"He transforms everything." Amys sounded troubled. "Rhuidean. The Lost Ones. The bleakness, and telling what should not have been told." The Wise Ones - all the Aiel, for that matter - still had difficulty speaking of that

"The Maidens cluster about him as though they owe more to him than to their own clans," Bair added. "For the first time ever, they have allowed a man beneath a Roof of the Maidens." For a moment Amys looked about to say something, but whatever she knew about the inner workings of Far Dareis Mai she shared with no one but those who were or had been Maidens of the Spear.

"The chiefs no longer listen to us as they did," Melaine muttered. "Oh, they ask our advice as always - they have not become complete fools - but Bael will no longer tell me what he has said to Rand al'Thor, or Rand al'Thor to him. He says I must ask Rand al'Thor, who tells me to ask Bael. The Car'a'carn, I can do nothing about, but Bael... He has always been a stubborn, infuriating man, yet now he is beyond all bounds. Sometimes I want to thump his head with a stick." Amys and Bair chuckled as if that were a fine joke. Or perhaps they just wanted to laugh to forget the changes for a time.

"There are only three things you can do with a man like that," Bair chortled. "Stay away from him, kill him, or marry him."

Melaine stiffened, her sun-dark face going red. For a moment Egwene thought the golden-haired Wise One was about to let fly words hotter than her face. Then a biting gust announced Aviendha's return carrying a worked silver tray holding a yellow-glazed teapot, delicate cups of golden Sea Folk porcelain, and a stone jar of honey.

She shivered as she poured - no doubt she had not bothered to wrap anything around herself out there - and hurriedly passed around the cups and the honey. She did not fill cups for herself and Egwene until Amys told her she could, of course.

"More steam," Melaine said; the chill air seemed to have cooled her temper. Aviendha set down her cup untouched and scrambled for the gourd, plainly trying to make up for her lapse with the tea.

"Egwene," Amys said, sipping her tea, "how would Rand al'Thor take it if Aviendha asked to sleep in his sleeping chamber?" Aviendha froze with the gourd in her hands.

"In his -?" Egwene gasped. "You cannot ask her to do such a thing! You cannot!"

"Fool girl," Bair muttered. "We do not ask her to share his blankets. But will he think that is what she asks? Will he even allow it? Men are strange creatures at the best, and he was not raised among us, so he is stranger still."

"He certainly would not think any such thing," Egwene spluttered, then more slowly, "I don't think he would. But it isn't proper. It just isn't!"

"I ask that you not require this of me," Aviendha said, sounding more humble than Egwene would have believed she could. She was sprinkling water in jerky motions, sending up increasing clouds of steam. "I have been learning a great deal the past days, not having to spend time with him. Since you have allowed Egwene and Moiraine Sedai to help me with channeling, I learn even faster. Not that they teach any better than you, of course," she added hastily, "but I want very much to learn."

"You will still learn," Melaine told her. "You will not have to stay every hour with him. As long as you apply yourself, your lessons will not be much slowed. You do not study while you sleep."

"I cannot," Aviendha mumbled, head down over the water gourd. More loudly, and more firmly, she added, "I will not." Her head came up, and her eyes were blue-green fire. "I will not be there when he summons that flip-skirt Isendre to his blankets again!"

Egwene gaped at her. "Isendre!" She had seen - and heartily disapproved of - the scandalous way the Maidens kept the woman naked, but this! "You can't really mean he -"

"Be silent!" Bair snapped like a whip. Her blue-eyed stare could have chipped stone. "Both of you! You are both young, but even the Maidens should know men can be fools, especially when they are not attached to a woman who can guide them."

"I am glad," Amys said dryly, "to see you no longer hold your emotions so tightly, Aviendha. Maidens are as foolish as men when it comes to that; I remember it well, and it embarrasses me still. Letting emotions go clouds judgment for a moment, but holding them in clouds it always. Just be sure you do not release them too often, or when it is best to keep control of them."

Melaine leaned forward on her hands, until it seemed the sweat dripping from her face must fall on the hot kettle. "You know your fate, Aviendha. You will be a Wise One of great strength and great authority, and more besides. You already have a strength in you. It saw you through your first test, and it will see you through this."

"My honor," Aviendha said hoarsely, then swallowed, unable to go on. She crouched there, huddling around the gourd as if it contained the honor she wanted to protect.

"The Pattern does not see ji'e'toh," Bair told her, with only a hint of sympathy, if that. "Only what must and will be. Men and Maidens struggle against fate even when it is clear the Pattern weaves on despite their struggles, but you are no longer Far Dareis Mai. You must learn to ride fate. Only by surrendering to the Pattern can you begin to have some control over the course of your own life. If you fight, the Pattern will still force you, and you will find only misery where you might have found contentment instead."

To Egwene, that sounded very much like what she had been taught concerning the One Power. To control saidar, you first had to surrender to it. Fight, and it would come wildly, or overwhelm you; surrender and guide it gently, and it did as you wished. But that did not explain why they wanted Aviendha to do this thing. She asked as much, adding again, "It is not proper."

Instead of answering, Amys said, "Will Rand al'Thor refuse to allow her? We cannot force him." Bair and Melaine were looking at Egwene as intently as Amys.

They were not going to tell her why. It was easier to make a stone talk than to get something out of a Wise One against her will. Aviendha was studying her toes in sulky resignation; she knew the Wise Ones would get what they wanted, one way or another.

"I don't know," Egwene said slowly. "I do not know him as well as I used to." She regretted that, but so much had happened, quite aside from her realizing that she did not love him as more than a brother. Her training, in the Tower as well as here, had changed things just as much as him being who he had become. "If you give him a good reason, perhaps. I think he likes Aviendha." The young Aiel woman heaved a heavy sigh without looking up.

"A good reason," Bair snorted. "When I was a girl, any man would have been overjoyed to have a young woman show that much interest in him. He would have gone to pick the flowers for her bridal wreath himself." Aviendha started, and glared at the Wise Ones with some of her old spirit. "Well, we will find a reason even someone raised in the wetlands can accept."

"It is several nights before your agreed meeting in Tel'aran'rhiod," Amys said. "With Nynaeve, this time."

"That one could learn much," Bair put in, "if she were not so stubborn."

"Your nights are free until then," Melaine said. "That is, unless you have been entering Tel'aran'rhiod without us."

Egwene suspected what was coming. "Of course not," she told them. It had only been a little. Any more than a little, and they would find out for sure.

"Have you succeeded in finding either Nynaeve's or Elayne's dreams?" Amys asked. Casually, as if it were nothing.

"No, Amys."

Finding someone else's dreams was a lot harder than stepping into Tel'aran'rhiod, the World of Dreams, especially if they were any distance away. It was easier both the closer they were and the better you knew them. The Wise Ones still demanded that she not enter Tel'aran'rhiod without at least one of them along, but someone else's dream was maybe just as dangerous in its own way. In Tel'aran'rhiod she was in control of herself and of things around her to a large degree, unless one of the Wise Ones decided to take over; her command of Tel'aran'rhiod was increasing, but she still could not match any of them, with their long experience In another's dream, though, you were a part of that dream; it took all you could muster not to behave as the dreamer wanted, be as their dream took you, and still sometimes it did not work. The Wise Ones had been very careful when watching Rand's dreams never to enter fully. Even so they insisted she learn. If they were to teach dreamwalking, they meant to teach all that they knew of it.

She was not reluctant, exactly, but the few times they had let her practice, with themselves and once with Rhuarc, had been chastening experiences. The Wise Ones had some considerable mastery over their own dreams, so what had happened there - to show her the dangers, they said - had all been their doing, but it had been a shock to learn that Rhuarc saw her as a little more than a child, like his youngest daughters. And her own control had wavered for one fatal moment. After that she had been little more than a child; she still could not look at the man without remembering being given a doll for studying hard. And being as pleased with the gift as with his approval. Amys had had to come and take her away from happy play with it. Amys knowing was bad enough, but she suspected that Rhuarc remembered some of it, too.

"You must keep trying," Amys said. "You have the strength to reach them, even as far as they are. And it will do you no harm to learn how they see you."

She was not so sure of that herself. Elayne was a friend, but Nynaeve had been Wisdom of Emond's Field for most of her growing up. She suspected Nynaeve's dreams would be worse than Rhuarc's.

"Tonight I will sleep away from the tents," Amys went on. "Not far. You should be able to find me easily, if you try. If I do not dream of you, we will speak of it in the morning."

Egwene suppressed a groan. Amys had guided her to Rhuarc's dreams - she herself had remained only an instant, barely long enough to reveal that Rhuarc still saw her, unchanged, as the young woman he had married - and the Wise Ones had always been in the same tent before when she tried.

"Well," Bair said; rubbing her hands, "we have heard what needed to be heard. The rest of you can remain if you wish, but I feel clean enough to go to my blankets. I am not so young as the rest of you." Young or not, she could probably run any of them into the ground, then carry them the rest of the way.

As Bair was getting to her feet, Melaine spoke, and strangely for her, she was hesitant. "I need... I must ask your help, Bair. And you, Amys." The older woman settled back, and both she and Amys looked at Melaine expectantly. "I... would ask you to approach Dorindha for me." The last words came out in a rush. Amys smiled widely, and Bair cackled aloud. Aviendha seemed to understand, too, and be startled, but Egwene was lost.

Then Bair laughed. "You always said you did not need a husband and did not want one. I have buried three, and would not mind another. They are very useful when the night is cold."

"A woman can change her mind." Melaine's voice was firm enough, but belied by the deep flush in her cheeks. "I cannot stay away from Bael, and I cannot kill him. If Dorindha will accept me as her sister-wife, I will make my bridal wreath to lay at Bael's feet."

"What if he steps on it instead of picking it up?" Bair wanted to know. Amys fell back, laughing and slapping her thighs.

Egwene did not think there was much danger of that, not the way Aiel customs ran. If Dorindha decided she wanted Melaine for sister-wife, Bael would not have much say in the matter. It no longer shocked her, precisely, that a man could have two wives. Not exactly. Different lands mean different customs, she reminded herself firmly. She had never been able to bring herself to ask, but for all she knew, there might be Aiel women with two husbands. They were very strange people.

"I ask you to act as my first-sisters in this. I think that Dorindha likes me well enough."

As soon as Melaine spoke those words, the other women's hilarity changed to something else. They still laughed, but they hugged her and told her how happy they were for her, and how well she would do with Bael. Amys and Bair, at least, took Dorindha's acceptance for granted. The three of them departed all but arm-in-arm, still laughing and giggling like girls. Not before telling Egwene and Aviendha to straighten the tent, though.

"Egwene, could a woman of your land accept a sister-wife?" Aviendha asked, using a stick to push the cover off the smoke hole.

Egwene wished she had left that duty till last; the heat began to dissipate immediately. "I don't know," she said, quickly gathering the cups and the honey jar. The staera went onto the tray, too. "I don't think so. Maybe if it was a close friend," she added hurriedly; there was no point in seeming to denigrate Aiel ways.

Aviendha only grunted and began pushing up the side flaps.

Teeth chattering as loudly as the rattle of teacups and bronze blades on the tray, Egwene scurried outside. The Wise Ones were dressing unhurriedly, as though this were a balmy night and they in sleeping chambers in some hold. A white-robed figure, pale in the moonlight, took the tray from her, and she quickly began searching for her cloak and shoes. They were nowhere among the remaining garments on the ground.

"I had your things taken to your tent," Bair said, tying the laces of her blouse. "You will not need them yet."

Egwene's stomach sank into her feet. Hopping in place, she flapped her arms in a futile effort for warmth; at least they did not tell her to stop. Abruptly she realized the snowy-robed figure bearing the tray away was too tall for even an Aiel woman. Gritting her teeth, she glared at the Wise Ones, who seemed not to care if she froze to death jumping up and down. To the Aiel women it might not matter that a man had seen them with no clothes on, at least if he was gai'shain, but it did to her!

In a moment, Aviendha joined them and, seeing her leaping about, merely stood there without any effort to find her own garments. She showed no more effect of the cold than the Wise Ones.

"Now," Bair said, settling her shawl on her shoulders. "You, Aviendha, are not only stubborn as a man, you cannot remember a simple task you have done many times. You, Egwene, are just as stubborn, and you still think you can linger in your tent when you are summoned. Let us hope running fifty times around the camp will temper your stubbornness, clear your minds, and remind you of how to answer a summons or do a chore. Off with you."

Without a word, Aviendha immediately began loping toward the edge of the camp, easily dodging dark shrouded tent ropes. Egwene hesitated only a moment before following. The Aiel woman kept her pace down so she could catch up. The night air froze her, and the cracked stony clay underfoot was just as cold, and tried to catch her toes besides. Aviendha ran with effortless ease.

As they reached the last tent and turned southward, Aviendha said, "Do you know why I study so hard?" Neither the cold nor running had made an impression on her voice.

Egwene was shivering so hard she could barely speak. "No. Why?"

"Because Bair and the others always point to you, and tell me how easily you learn, how you never have to have something explained twice. They say I ought to be more like you." She gave Egwene a sidelong glance, and Egwene found herself sharing a giggle as they ran. "That is part of the reason. The things I am learning to do..." Aviendha shook her head, wonderment plain even by moonlight. "And the Power itself. I have never felt like that. So alive. I can smell the faintest scent, feel the slightest stir in the air."

"It is dangerous to hold on too long or too much," Egwene said. Running did seem to warm her a little, though now and again a shudder ran through her. "I've told you that, and I know the Wise Ones have, too."

Aviendha merely sniffed. "Do you think I would stab my own foot with a spear?"

For a time they ran in silence.

"Did Rand really...?" Egwene said finally. The cold had nothing to do with her difficulty getting the words out; in fact, she was beginning to sweat again. "I mean Isendre?" She could not make herself say it clearer than that.At last Aviendha said slowly, "I do not think that he did." She sounded angry. "But why would she ignore switchings if he has shown no interest in her? She is a milk-hearted wetlander who waits for men to come to her. I saw how he looked at her, though he tried to hide it. He enjoyed looking at her."

Egwene wondered if her friend ever thought of her as a milk-hearted wetlander. Probably not, or they would not be friends. But Aviendha had never learned to worry if what she said might hurt someone; she would probably be surprised to learn that Egwene could even think of being hurt.

"The way the Maidens make her dress," Egwene admitted reluctantly, "any man would look." Reminded that she herself was in the open without any clothes, she stumbled and almost fell as she looked around anxiously. The night was empty as far as she could make out. Even the Wise Ones were already back in their tents. Warm in their blankets. She was sweating, but the beads seemed to want to freeze as soon as they appeared.

"He belongs to Elayne," Aviendha said fiercely.

"I admit I don't know your customs fully, but ours are not the same as yours. He is not betrothed to Elayne." Why am I defending him? He's the one who ought to be switched! But honesty made her go on. "Even your Aiel men have the right to say no, if they're asked."

"You and she are near-sisters, as you and I are," Aviendha protested, slowing a step before picking it up again. "Did you not ask me to look after him for her? Do you not want her to have him?"

"Of course I do. If he wants her." That was not exactly true. She wanted Elayne to have what happiness she could, in love with the Dragon Reborn as she was, and she would do everything short of tying Rand hand and foot to see that Elayne got what she wanted. Maybe not far short, at that, if need be. Admitting it was another thing. Aiel women were far more forward than she could ever make herself be. "It would not be right, otherwise."

"He belongs to her," Aviendha said determinedly.

Egwene sighed. Aviendha simply did not want to understand any customs but her own. The Aiel woman was still shocked that Elayne would not ask Rand to marry her, that a man could ask that question. "I'm sure the Wise Ones will listen to reason tomorrow. They can't make you sleep in a man's bedchamber."

The other woman looked at her in clear surprise. For a moment her grace left her, and she stubbed a toe on the uneven ground; the mishap brought a few curses that would have made even Kadere's wagon drivers listen with interest - and made Bair reach for the bluespine - but she did not stop running. "I do not understand why that upsets you so," she said when the last curse died. "I have slept next to a man many times on raids, even sharing blankets for warmth if the night was very cold, but it disturbs you that I will sleep within ten feet of him. Is this part of your customs? I have noticed you will not bathe in the sweat tent with men. Do you not trust Rand al'Thor? Or is it me you do not trust?" Her voice had sunk to a concerned whisper by the end.

"Of course I trust you," Egwene protested heatedly. "And him. It's just that..." She trailed off, uncertain how to go on. Aiel notions of propriety were sometimes stricter than what she had grown up with, but in other ways they would have had the Women's Circle back home trying to decide whether to faint or reach for a stout stick. "Aviendha, if your honor is involved somehow..." This was touchy ground. "Surely if you explain to the Wise Ones, they will not make you go against your honor."

"There is nothing to explain," the other woman said flatly.

"I know I don't understand ji'e'toh..." Egwene began, and Aviendha laughed.

"You say you do not understand, Aes Sedai, yet you show that you live by it." Egwene regretted maintaining that lie with her - it had been hard work to get Aviendha to call her simply Egwene, and sometimes she slipped back - but it had to be kept with everyone if it was to hold with anyone. "You are Aes Sedai, and strong enough in the Power to overcome Amys and Melaine together," Aviendha continued, "but you said that you would obey, so you scrub pots when they say scrub pots, and you run when they say run. You may not know ji'e'toh, but you follow it."

It was not the same thing at all, of course. She gritted her teeth and did as she was told because that was the only way to learn dreamwalking, and she wanted to learn, to learn everything, more than anything else she could imagine. To even think that she could live by this foolish ji'e'toh was simply silly. She did what she had to do, and only when and because she had to.

They were coming back to where they had begun. As her foot hit the spot, Egwene said, "That's one," and ran on through the darkness with no one to see but Aviendha, no one to say whether she went back to her tent right then. Aviendha would not have told, but it never occurred to Egwene to stop short of the fifty.