The Breaking Storm

The Breaking Storm

Perrin opened his eyes slowly, staring up at the plain white plastered ceiling. It took a moment to realize he was in a four-posted bed, lying on a feather mattress with a blanket over him and a goose-down pillow under his head. A myriad of scents danced in his nose; the feathers and the wool of the blanket, a goose roasting, bread and honeycakes baking. One of the Winespring Inn's rooms. With unmistakable bright morning light streaming in at the white-curtained windows. Morning. He fumbled at his side. Unbroken skin met his fingers, but he felt weaker than at any time since being shot. A small enough price, though, and a fair enough exchange. His throat felt parched, too.

When he moved, Faile leaped up from a chair beside the small stone fireplace, tossing aside a red blanket and stretching. She had changed to a darker narrow-skirted riding dress, and wrinkles in the gray silk said she had slept in that chair. "Alanna said you needed sleep," she said. He reached toward the white pitcher on the small table beside the bed, and she hurriedly poured a cup of water and held it for him to drink. "You need to stay right here for another two or three days, until you have your strength back."

The words sounded normal, except for an undercurrent he barely caught, a tightness at the corners of her eyes. "What is wrong?"

She replaced the cup carefully on the bedside table and smoothed her dress. "Nothing is wrong." The taut underlying tone was even clearer.

"Faile, don't lie to me."

"I do not lie!" she snapped. "I will have some breakfast brought up to you, and you're lucky I do that, calling me -"

"Faile." He said her name as sternly as he could, and she hesitated, her most arrogant, chin-up glare changing to forehead-creasing worry and back again. He met her gaze straight on; she was not going 151k1011b to get away with any fine lady's haughty tricks with him.

At last, she sighed. "I suppose you have a right to know. But you are still staying in that bed until Alanna and I say you can get up. Loial and Gaul are gone."

"Gone?" He blinked in confusion. "What do you mean gone? They left?"

"In a way. The sentries saw them go, this morning at first light, trotting off into the Westwood together. None of them thought anything of it; certainly none tried to stop them, an Ogier and an Aiel. I heard of it less than an hour ago. They were talking about trees, Perrin. About how the Ogier sing to trees."

"Trees?" Perrin growled. "It's that bloody Waygate! Burn me, I told him not to... They'll get themselves killed before they reach it!"

Throwing off the blanket, he swung his legs over the side of the bed, wobbling to his feet. He had nothing on, he realized, not even his smallclothes. But if they expected to keep him caged under a blanket, they were sadly mistaken. He could see everything folded neatly on the tall-backed chair by the door, with his boots beside it and his axe hanging by its belt from a peg on the wall. Stumbling to his clothes, he began dressing as quickly as he could.

"What are you doing?" Faile demanded. "You put yourself back in that bed!" One fist on her hip, she pointed commandingly, as if her finger could transport him there.

"They can't have gotten that far," he told her. "Not afoot. Gaul won't ride, and Loial always did claim he trusted his own feet more than any horse. I can catch them up on Stepper by midday latest." Pulling his shirt over his head he left it hanging loose over his breeches and sat down- dropped, actually - to draw on his boots.

"You are mad, Perrin Aybara! What chance you can even find them in that forest?"

"I am not so bad at tracking, myself. I can find them." He smiled at her, but she was not having any.

"You can get yourself killed, you hairy fool! Look at you. You can hardly stand. You would fall out of the saddle before you had gone a mile!"

Hiding the effort involved, he stood and stamped his feet to settle them in his boots. Stepper would do all the work; he only needed to hold on. "Nonsense. I'm strong as a horse. Stop trying to bully me." Shrugging into his coat, he snatched up his axe and belt. Faile caught his arm as he opened the door, and was pulled along, vainly trying to haul him back.

"Sometimes you have the brains of a horse," she panted. "Less! Perrin, you must listen to me. You must -"

The room lay only a few steps along the narrow hallway from the stairs leading down to the empty common room, and it was the stairs that betrayed him. When his knee bent to lower him that first step, it kept right on bending; he toppled forward, vainly trying to catch the banister, pulling a yelling Faile with him. Rolling over and over, they thumped down the stairs to come up with a final thud against the barrel at the bottom, Faile lying stretched full-length atop him. The barrel teetered and spun, rattling the swords inside, before settling with a final clank.

It took a moment for Perrin to gather enough breath to speak. "Are you all right?" he said anxiously. She was sprawled limply on his chest. He shook her gently. "Faile, are you -?"

Slowly she raised her head and brushed a few short strands of dark hair from her face, then stared at him intently. "Are you all right? Because if you are, I may very well do something violent to you."

Perrin snorted; she was probably hurt less than he. Gingerly, he felt at where the arrow had been, but that was in no worse shape than the rest of him. Of course, the rest of him seemed bruised from head to toe. "Get off of me, Faile. I need to fetch Stepper."

Instead, she seized his collar with both hands and leaned very close, until their noses almost touched. "Listen to me, Perrin," she said urgently. "You - can - not - do - everything. If Loial and Gaul have gone to lock the Waygate, you must let them. Your place is here. Even if you were strong enough - and you are not! Do you hear me? You are not strong enough! - but even if you were, you must not go after them. You cannot do everything!"

"Why, whatever are you two doing?" Marin al'Vere said. Wiping her hands on her long white apron, she came from the back door of the common room. Her eyebrows looked to be trying to climb into her hair. "I expected Trollocs after all that racket, but not this." She sounded half scandalized, and half amused.

What they looked like, Perrin realized, with Faile lying on him that way, their heads close together, was a couple playing kissing games. On the floor of the common room.

Faile's cheeks reddened and she got up very quickly, dusting her dress. "He is as stubborn as a Trolloc, Mistress al'Vere. I told him he was too weak to rise. He must go back to his bed immediately. He has to learn he cannot do everything himself, especially when he cannot even walk down a flight of steps."

"Oh, my dear," Mistress al'Vere said, shaking her head, "that is quite the wrong way." Leaning close to the younger woman, she whispered softly, but Perrin heard every word. "He was an easy little boy to manage most of the time, if you handled him properly, but when you tried to push him, he was as muley as any in the Two Rivers. Men don't really change that much, only grow taller. If you go telling him what he must and musn't do, he will surely lay his ears back and dig his heels in. Let me show you." Marin turned a beaming smile on him, ignoring his glare. "Perrin, don't you think one of my good goose-feather mattresses is better than that floor? I'll bring you some of my kidney pie just as soon as we have you tucked in. You must be hungry, after no supper last night. Here. Why don't let me help you up?"

Pushing their hands away, he stood on his own. Well, with the aid of the wall. He thought he might have sprained half the muscles in his body. Muley? He had never been muley in his life. "Mistress al'Vere, would you have Hu or Tad saddle Stepper?"

"When you're better," she said, trying to turn him toward the stairs. "Don't you think you could do with just a little more rest?" Faile took his other arm.

"Trollocs!" The cry from outside came muffled through the walls, echoed by a dozen voices. "Trollocs! Trollocs!"

"That needn't concern you today," Mistress al'Vere said, firm and soothing at the same time. It made him want to grit his teeth. "The Aes Sedai will handle things nicely. In a day or two we'll have you back on your feet. You will see."

"My horse," he said, trying to pull free. They had good holds on his coatsleeves; all he accomplished was swinging them back and forth. "For the love of the Light, will you stop tugging at me and let me get my horse? Let go of me."

Looking at his face, Faile sighed and released his arm. "Mistress al'Vere, will you have his horse saddled and brought around?"

"But my dear, he really needs -"

"If you please, Mistress al'Vere," Faile said firmly. "And my horse, too." The two women looked at each other as if he did not exist. At last Mistress al'Vere nodded.

Perrin frowned at her back as she hurried across the common room and vanished toward the kitchen, and the stable. What had Faile said different from what he had? Turning his attention to her, he said, "Why did you change your mind?"

Tucking his shirt in for him, she muttered under her breath. Doubtless he was not supposed to hear well enough to understand. "I musn't say must, must I? When he is too stubborn to see straight, I must lead him with honey and smiles, must I?" She shot him a glare that surely had no honey in it, then abruptly changed to a smile so sweet he very nearly backed away. "My dear heart," she almost cooed, pulling his coat straight, "whatever is happening out there, I do hope you will stay in your saddle, and as far from Trollocs as you can. You really are not up to facing a Trolloc just yet, are you? Maybe tomorrow. Please remember you are a general, a leader, and every bit as much a symbol to your people as that banner out there. If you are up where people can see you, it will lift everyone's heart. And it is much easier to see what needs doing and give orders if you aren't in the fighting yourself." Picking his belt off the floor, she buckled it around his waist, settling the axe carefully on his hip. She also batted her eyes at him! "Please say you will do that. Please?"

She was right. He would not last two minutes against a Trolloc. More like two seconds against a Fade. And much as he hated to admit it, he would not last two miles in the saddle chasing after Loial and Gaul. Fool Ogier. You're a writer, not a hero. "All right," he said. A mischievous impulse seized him. The way she and Mistress al'Vere had been talking over his head, and batting her eyes as if he were a fool. "I can't refuse you anything when you smile so prettily."

"I am glad." Still smiling, she brushed at his coat, picking lint he could not see. "Because if you don't, and you manage to survive, I'll do to you what you did to me that first day in the Ways. I don't think you are strong enough yet to stop me." That smile beamed up into his face, all springtime and sweetness. "Do you understand me?"

He chuckled in spite of himself. "Sounds as if I had better let them kill me." She did not seem to think that was funny.

Hu and Tad, the lanky stablemen, led Stepper and Swallow around soon after they stepped outside. Everyone else seemed to be gathered at the far end of the village, beyond the Green with its sheep and cows and geese, and that crimson-and-white wolfhead banner rippling on the morning breeze. As soon as he and Faile were up on their horses, the stablemen took off running that way, too, without a word.

Whatever was going on, it was clearly not an attack. He could see women and children in the crowd, and the shouts of "Trolloc" had died down to a murmur like an echo of the geese. He rode slowly, not wanting to waver in his saddle; Faile kept Swallow close, watching him. If she could change her mind once for no reason, she could again, and he did not want any arguments about whether he should be there.

The babbling crowd did appear to contain everyone in Emond's Field, villagers and farmers alike, all jammed shoulder to shoulder, but they made way for him and Faile when they saw who he was. His name entered the murmurs, usually tagged with Goldeneyes. He picked up the word "Trollocs," too, but in tones more wondering than frightened. From Stepper's back he had a good view over their heads.

The knotted mass of people stretched all the way beyond the last houses to the hedge of sharpened stakes. The edge of the forest, nearly six hundred paces off across a field of stumps nearly level with the ground, was quiet and empty of men with axes. Those men made a sweaty, bare-chested ring in the crowd surrounding Alanna and Verin and two men. Jon Thane, the miller, was wiping a smear of blood from his ribs, lantern jaw on his chest so he could stare at what his hands were doing. Alanna straightened from the other man, a grizzle-haired fellow Perrin did not know, who leaped to his feet and danced a step as if not quite believing he could. He and the miller both looked at the Aes Sedai with awe.

The tangle around the Aes Sedai was too tight for anyone to shift aside for Stepper and Swallow, but there were smaller clear pockets around Ihvon and Tomas, off to either side on their war-horses. Folk did not want to come too near those fierce-eyed animals, both looking as though they only wanted an opportunity to bite or trample.

Perrin managed to reach Tomas without too much trouble. "What happened?"

"A Trolloc. Only one." Despite the graying Warder's conversational tone, his dark eyes did not rest on Perrin and Faile, but kept an almost equal watch on Verin and on the treeline. "They usually are not very smart, alone. Sly, but not smart. The timbering party drove it away before it did more than draw some blood."

From out of the trees the two Aiel women appeared, running, heads shoufa-wrapped and veiled so he could not tell which was which. They slowed to snake between the sharp-pointed stakes, then slipped deftly through the crowd, people moving out of their way as much as possible in that press. By the time they reached Faile, they had unveiled, and she leaned down to listen.

"Perhaps five hundred Trollocs," Bain told her, "probably no more than a mile or two behind us." Her voice was level, but her dark blue eyes sparkled with eagerness. So did Chiad's gray.

"As I expected," Tomas said calmly. "That one likely wandered off from the larger body hoping to find a meal. The rest will be coming soon, I think." The Maidens nodded.

Perrin gestured in consternation at the jam of people. "They shouldn't be out here, then. Why haven't you cleared them away?"

It was Ihvon, bringing his gray into the gathering, who answered. "Your people do not seem to want to listen to outsiders, not when they can watch Aes Sedai. I would suggest you see what you can do."

Perrin was sure they could have imposed some sort of order had they really tried. Verin and Alanna surely could have. So why did they wait and leave it to me, if they expected Trollocs? It would have been easy to put it down to ta'veren - easy, and foolish. Ihvon and Tomas were not going to let Trollocs kill them - or Verin, or Alanna - while waiting for a ta'veren to tell them what to do. The Aes Sedai were maneuvering him, risking everyone, maybe even themselves. But to what possible end? He met Faile's eyes, and she nodded slightly, as if she knew what he was thinking.

He had no time to try figuring it out now. Scanning the crowd, he spotted Bran al'Vere, putting his head together with Tam al'Thor and Abell Cauthon. The Mayor had a long spear on his shoulder and a dented old round steel cap on his head. A leather jerkin sewn all over with steel discs strained around his bulk.

All three men looked up when Perrin pushed Stepper through the crowd to them. "Bain says Trollocs are heading this way, and the Warders think we may be attacked soon." He had to shout because of the incessant drone of voices. Some of the nearer folk heard and fell silent; quiet spread on ripples of "Trolloc" and "attack."

Bran blinked. "Yes. It had to come, didn't it? Yes, well, we know what to do." He should have looked comic, with his jerkin ready to pop its seams and his steel cap wobbling when he nodded, but he only looked determined. Raising his voice, he announced, "Perrin says the Trollocs will be here soon. You all know your places. Hurry, now. Hurry."

The crowd stirred and flowed, women herding children back toward the houses, men milling every which way. Confusion seemed to grow more rather than less.

"I'll see to getting the shepherds in," Abell told Perrin, and dove into the throng.

Cenn Buie pushed past in the moil, using a halberd to herd sour-faced Hari Coplin and Hari's brother Darl and old Bili Congar, who staggered as if already full of ale this morning, which he probably was. Of the three, Bili carried his spear most as if he meant to use it. Cenn touched his forehead to Perrin in a sort of salute. A number of the men did. It made him uncomfortable. Dannil and the other lads were one thing, but these men were half again his age and more.

"You are doing fine," Faile said.

"I wish I knew what Verin and Alanna were up to," he muttered. "And I don't mean right now." Two of the catapults the Warders had had built stood at this end of the village, squarish things taller than a man, all heavy timbers and thick, twisted ropes. From their horses, Ihvon and Tomas were overseeing the stout wooden beams being winched down. The two Aes Sedai were more interested in the big fieldstones, fifteen or twenty pounds each, being loaded in cups on the end of those arms.

"They mean you to be a leader," Faile replied quietly. "It is what you were born for, I think."

Perrin snorted. He had been born to be a blacksmith. "I'd be a lot more comfortable if I knew why they wanted it." The Aes Sedai were looking at him, Verin with head tilted, birdlike, Alanna with a franker stare and a small smile. Did they both want the same thing, and for the same reason? That was one of the troubles with Aes Sedai. There were always more questions than answers.

Order asserted itself with surprising quickness. Along this west end of the village a hundred men knelt on one knee right behind the bristle of stakes, uneasily fingering spears or halberds or some polearm made from a bush hook or scythe. Here and there one wore a helmet or some bit of armor. To their rear, twice as many formed two lines holding good Two Rivers longbows, each with a pair of quivers at his belt. Young boys came running from the houses with bundles of more arrows that the men drove point-down in the ground in front of their feet. Tam seemed to be in charge, dressing the ranks and speaking a few words to each man, but Bran marched along with him, offering his own encouragement. Perrin could not see that they needed him at all.

To his surprise, Dannil and Ban and all the other lads who had ridden with him came trotting out of the village to surround him and Faile, all with their bows. They looked odd, in a way. The Aes Sedai had apparently Healed the more seriously injured, leaving those less hurt for Daise's poultices and ointments, so fellows who had been barely clinging to a saddle yesterday walked along sprightly now, while Dannil and Tell and others still limped or wore bandages. If he was surprised to see them, he was disgusted by what they brought. Leof Torfinn, the dressing wrapped around his head making a pale cap above his deep-set eyes, had his bow slung on his back and carried a tall staff with a smaller version of the red-bordered banner with its wolfhead.

"I think one of the Aes Sedai had it made," Leof said when Perrin asked where it came from. "Milli Ayellin brought it to Will's da, but Wil didn't want to carry it." Wil al'Seen hunched his shoulders a bit.

"I wouldn't want to carry it, either," Perrin said dryly. They all laughed as if he had made a joke, even Wil, after a minute.

The hedge of stakes looked fierce enough, but on the other hand, it seemed a pitiful thing to keep Trollocs out. Maybe it would, but he did not want Faile there if they made it through. When he looked at her, though, she had that look in her eyes again as if she knew what he was thinking. And did not like it. If he tried to send her back, she would argue and balk, refusing to see sense. Weak as he felt right then, she probably had a better chance of leading him back to the inn than he her. The way she was sitting her saddle so ferociously, she likely intended to defend him, if the Trollocs broke through. He would just have to keep a close eye on her; that was all there was to it.

Suddenly she smiled, and he scratched his beard. Maybe she could read his mind.

Time passed, the sun inching up, the day's warmth building. Now and then a woman called from the houses to ask what was happening. Here and there men sat down, but Tam or Bran was on them before they had their legs folded, chivying them back into line. No more than a mile or two, Bain had said. She and Chiad were sitting near the stakes, playing some game that apparently involved flipping a knife into the foot of ground between them. Surely if the Trollocs were coming, they would have come by now. He was beginning to find it hard to sit up straight. Conscious of Faile's watchful eyes, he kept his back stiff.

A horn blared, brazen and shrill.

"Trollocs!" half a dozen voices shouted, and bestial, blackmailed shapes flooded out of the Westwood, howling as they ran across the stumpy ground, waving scythe-curved swords and spiked axes, spears and tridents. Three Myrddraal rode behind them on black horses, darting back and forth as though driving the Trolloc charge before them. Their dead black cloaks hung motionless no matter how their mounts dashed or whirled. The horn sounded continuously in sharp, urging cries.

Twenty arrows leaped out as soon as the first Trolloc appeared, the strongest shot falling nearly a hundred paces short.

"Hold, you lack-witted sheep-brains!" Tam shouted. Bran jumped and gave him a startled look, no less incredulous than those coming from Tam's friends and neighbors; some muttered about not standing still for that kind of talk, Trollocs or no Trollocs. Tam rode right over their protests, though. "You hold till I give the word, the way I showed you!" Then, as if hundreds of shrieking Trollocs were not galloping toward him, Tam turned calmly to Perrin. "At three hundred paces?"

Perrin nodded quickly. The man was asking him? Three hundred paces. How quickly could a Trolloc cover three hundred paces? He eased his axe in its loop. That horn wailed and wailed. The spearmen crouched behind the stakes as if forcing themselves not to edge back. The Aiel had veiled their faces.

Onward the screaming tide came, all horned heads and faces with snouts or beaks, each half again as tall as a man, each shrieking for blood. Five hundred paces. Four hundred. Some were stretching out in front. They ran as fast as horses. Had the Aiel been right? Could there be only five hundred? It looked like thousands.

"Ready!" Tam called, and two hundred bows were raised. The young men with Perrin hurriedly formed up in front of him in imitation of their elders, ranking themselves with that fool banner.

Three hundred paces. Perrin could see those misshapen faces, contorted with rage and frenzy, as clearly as if they were right on top of him.

"Loose!" Tam shouted. Bowstrings slapped like one huge whip-crack. With twin crashes of beam against leather-padded beam, the catapults fired.

Broadhead arrows rained down into the Trollocs. Monstrous shapes fell, but some rose and staggered on, harried by the Fades. That horn wove into their guttural bellowing, sounding forward for the kill. The catapults' stones fell among them - and exploded in fire and shards, ripping open holes in the mass. Perrin was not the only one to jump; so that was what the Aes Sedai had been doing with the catapults. He wondered wildly what would happen if they dropped one of those stones loading it into the cup.

Another flight of arrows leaped out, and another, another, and again and again, and more stones from the catapults, if at a slower pace. Fiery explosions tore at the Trollocs. Broadhead points hailed down on them. And they came on, shrieking, howling, falling and dying, but always running forward. They were close now, close enough that the bowmen spread out, no longer firing in flights but choosing their targets. Men screamed their own rage, screamed in the face of death as they shot.

And then there were no more Trollocs standing. Only one Fade, bristling with arrows yet still staggering blindly. The shrill shrieks of a Myrddraal's thrashing horse competed with the moaning bellows of downed and dying Trollocs. The horn had fallen silent at last. Here and there across the stump-filled field, a Trolloc heaved and fell back. Under it all, Perrin could hear men panting as if they had run ten miles. His own heart seemed to be pounding out of his chest.

Suddenly someone raised a loud huzzah, and with that men began capering and shouting euphorically, waving bows or whatever they had over their heads, tossing caps in the air. Women rushed out from the houses, laughing and cheering, and children, all celebrating and dancing with the men. Some came running to grab Perrin's hand and shake it.

"You've led us to a great victory, my boy." Bran laughed up at him. He had his steel cap perched on the back of his head. "I suppose I shouldn't call you that, now. A great victory, Perrin."

"I didn't do anything," he protested. "I just sat on my horse. You did it." Bran listened no more than any of the others. Embarrassed, Perrin sat up straight, pretending to survey the field, and after a while they left him alone.

Tam had not joined in the celebrating; he stood close behind the stakes, studying the Trollocs. The Warders were not laughing, either. Black-mailed shapes littered the field among the low stumps. There could be five hundred of them. Maybe less. Some, a few, might have made it back to the trees. None lay closer than fifty paces from the pointed hedge. Perrin found the other two Fades, writhing on the ground. That accounted for all three. They would admit they were dead eventually.

The Two Rivers folk raised a thunderous cheer, for him. "Perrin Goldeneyes! Huzzah! Huzzah! Huzzah!"

"They had to know," he muttered. Faile looked at him questioningly. "The Halfmen had to know this wouldn't work. Look out there. Even I can see it, now; they must have from the start. If this was all they had, why did they try? And if there are more Trollocs out there, why didn't they all come? Twice as many, and we'd have had to fight them at the stakes. Twice that, and they might have broken through to the village."

"You've a good natural eye," Tomas said, reining in beside them. "This was a test. To see if you would break at the sight of a charge, perhaps to see how quickly you could react, or how your defenses are organized, or maybe something I've not thought of, but still a test. Now they see." He pointed to the sky, where a lone raven winged over the field. A natural raven would have lighted to feast among the dead. The bird completed a last circle and peeled off toward the forest. "The next attack will not come right away. I saw two or three Trollocs reach the forest, so word of this will spread. The Halfmen will have to make them remember they're more afraid of Myrddraal than of dying. That attack will come, however, and it will certainly be stronger than this. How strong depends on how many the Faceless have brought through the Ways."

Perrin grimaced. "Light! What if there are ten thousand of them?"

"Not likely," Verin said, walking up to pat Tomas's mount on the neck. The warhorse allowed her touch as meekly as a pony. "At least, not yet. Not even a Forsaken could move a large party through the Ways safely, I think. One man alone risks death or madness between the closest Waygates, but. . . say... a thousand men, or a thousand Trollocs, would very likely draw Machin Shin within minutes, a monstrous wasp to a bowl of honey. It is much more probable that they travel no more than ten or twenty together, fifty at most, and the groups spaced out. Of course, the questions remain of how many groups they are bringing, and how much time they allow to elapse between. And they would lose some anyway. It might be that Shadowspawn attract Machin Shin less than humankind, but... Hmmm. Fascinating thought. I wonder..." Patting Tomas on the leg much in the manner she had patted his horse, she turned away, already lost in study. The Warder heeled his horse after her.

"If you ride even one step near the Westwood," Faile said calmly, "I will haul you back to the inn by your ear and stuff you into that bed myself."

"I wasn't thinking of it," Perrin lied, turning Stepper so his back was to the woods. One man and an Ogier might escape notice, make it to the mountains safely. They might. The Waygate had to be locked permanently if Emond's Field was to have any chance. "You talked me out of it, remember?" Another man might find them, knowing they were there. Three sets of eyes could keep sharper watch than two, especially when one set was his, and he was certainly not doing anything here. His clothes stuffed with straw and set on Stepper could do as much.

Suddenly, above the shouting and carrying on around him, he heard sharper shouts, a clamor from the south, near the Old Road.

"He said they wouldn't come again soon!" he growled, and dug his heels into Stepper's flanks.