“That sounds lovely,” Moiraine breathed. Except the part about supper, anyway. She thought she could eat a whole sheep!
Siuan managed to walk on her own, but she hobbled, tight-jawed and clearly suppressing groans. She refused to let Moiraine carry her scrip, though. Siuan never gave in to pain. She never gave in to anything. When they reached their gallery in the Accepted’s quarters, thoughts of hot water vanished. Katerine was waiting.
“About time,” she said, huddling in her banded cloak. “I thought I’d freeze to death before you got back.” A sharp-faced woman with a mass of wavy black hair that hung to her waist, she could have an acid tongue. With novices and other Accepted, she could. With Aes Sedai, she was milder than milk-water, all obsequious smiles. “Merean wants you in her study, Moiraine.”
“Why does she want us?” Siuan demanded. “It isn’t full sunset even now.”
“Oh, Merean always tells me her reasons, Siuan. And it’s just Moiraine this time, not you. Well, you’ve been told, and I want my supper and my bed. We have to do this whole miserable thing over again tomorrow, starting at sunrise. Who’d have thought I’d rather stay in and study than go for a ride in the countryside?”
Siuan frowned at Katerine’s back as the other woman flounced away. “One day she’ll cut herself with that tongue. Do you want me to come with you, Moiraine?”
Moiraine wanted nothing more. She had not done anything, not lately, yet a summons to Merean’s study was never good. Many of the novices and Accepted visited that room to cry on Merean’s shoulder when homesickness or the strain of learning grew too great. A summons was another matter entirely. But she shook her head and handed her cloak and scrip to Siuan. “The jar of ointment is in there. It is very good for soreness.” Her friend’s face lit up.
“I could still come with you. I don’t need salving that badly.”
“You can barely walk. Go on. Whatever Merean wants, I am sure she will not keep me long.” Light, she hoped Merean had not uncovered some prank she thought safely hidden. But if so, at least Siuan would escape punishment. In her present state, she could not have borne that.
The study of the Mistress of Novices lay on the other side of the Tower, near the novices’ quarters and one level below the Amyrlin’s study, on a wide hallway where the floor tiles were red and green and the runner blue. Moiraine took a deep breath in front of the plain door between two bright wall hangings and patted her hair, wishing she had taken time to use her brush, then knocked twice, firmly. Merean told everyone not to tap like mice in the wainscoting.
“Come,” a voice inside called.
Taking another deep breath, Moiraine went in.
Unlike the Amyrlin’s study, Merean’s was rather small and quite plain, the walls paneled in dark wood, the furniture sturdy and completely unadorned for the most part. Moiraine suspected that women who had been Accepted a hundred years ago would recognize everything in the room. Maybe two hundred years ago. The narrow tea-table beside the door, lightly carved on the legs in a strange pattern, might well have been older than that, and one wall held a mirror, its frame spotted with faded fragments of gilding. Against the opposite wall stood a narrow cabinet that she avoided looking at. The strap and the switch were kept in there, along with a slipper that was worse in a way.
To her surprise, Merean was on her feet rather than seated behind her writing table. She was tall—Moiraine’s head only reached Merean’s plump chin—with hair that was more gray than not, gathered at the nape of her neck, and a motherly look to her that almost overwhelmed the agelessness of her features. That was one reas
on most of the young women in training felt comfortable weeping on Merean’s shoulder despite her having made them weep herself often enough. She was also kind and gentle and understanding. So long as you did not break the rules. Merean had a positive Talent for finding out what you most wanted to keep hidden.
“Sit down, child,” she said gravely.
Moiraine warily seated herself on the stool in front of the writing table. It had to be bad news of some sort. But what?
“There is no way to make this easy, child. King Laman was killed yesterday, along with both of his brothers. Remember that we are all threads in the Pattern, and the Wheel weaves as the Wheel wills.”
“The Light illumine their souls,” Moiraine said solemnly, “and may they shelter in the Creator’s hand until they are born again.”
Merean’s eyebrows twitched upward, doubtless in surprise that she had not burst into tears on hearing that she had lost three uncles in one day. But then, Merean did not know Laman Damodred, a distant man who burned with ambition, the only warmth in him. Moiraine’s opinion was that he had remained unmarried for the simple reason that even the inducement of becoming Queen of Cairhien was not enough to convince any woman to marry him. Moressin and Aldecain had been worse, each filled with sufficient heat for ten men, which they had expressed in anger and cruelty. And in contempt for her father because he was a scholar, because he had taken another scholar for his second wife rather than marrying to bring lands or connections to House Damodred. She would pray for their souls, yet she felt more sadness for Jac Wynn than for all three of her uncles combined.
“Shock,” Merean murmured. “You’re in shock, but it will pass. When it does, come to me, child. Until then, there’s no need for you to go out tomorrow. I’ll inform the Amyrlin.” The Mistress of Novices had the final say when it came to novices and Accepted. Merean must have been put out to learn that Tamra had sent them out of the city without consulting her.
“Thank you for the kindness,” Moiraine said quickly, “but please, no. Having something to do will help, and being with friends. If I remain behind tomorrow, I will be alone.”
Merean seemed doubtful, but after more soothing words—words to soothe the hurt she seemed sure Moiraine must be hiding—she let Moiraine return to her room, where she found both of her oil lamps lit and a fire crackling on her hearth. Siuan’s work, no doubt. She thought of dropping into Siuan’s room, but the other woman was certainly fast asleep by now.
Supper would be available in the dining halls for at least another hour, but she put away any thought of food and instead spent that time kneeling in prayer for her uncles’ souls. A penance. She did not mean to be one of those sisters who took on penances at every turn—maintaining a balance in their lives, they called it; she thought it ostentatious foolishness—yet she should feel something for the deaths of her own blood kin, however horrible they had been. It was wrong not to. Only when she knew that the dining halls would be full of serving women mopping the floors did she rise and undress to wash herself. After using a trickle of Fire to heat the water. Cold water would have been another penance, but there were limits.
Extinguishing her lamps, she wove a ward to keep her dreams from affecting anyone else’s—that could happen with those who could channel; others nearby could find themselves sharing your dreams—and crawled beneath her blankets. She truly was tired, and sleep came quickly. Unfortunately, nightmares came, too. Not of her uncles, or even of Jac Wynn, but of an infant lying in the snow on Dragonmount. Lightning flashed in the pitch-black sky, and his wails were the thunder. Dreams of a faceless young man. There was lightning in those dreams, too, but he called this lightning from the sky, and cities burned. Nations burned. The Dragon was Reborn. She woke weeping.
The fire had burned down to a few glowing coals. Rather than adding more wood, she used the fire-shovel to scoop ashes over the coals, and rather than climbing back into bed, she wrapped a blanket around herself and went out into the night. She was not sure she could go back to sleep, but one thing she was certain of. She did not want to sleep alone.
She was certain that Siuan must be asleep, but when she slipped into her friend’s room, quickly closing the door behind her, Siuan said softly, “Moiraine?” A few flames still flickered on Siuan’s small hearth, giving enough light to see her pull one side of her blankets back.
Moiraine wasted no time climbing in. “Did you have nightmares, too?”
“Yes,” Siuan breathed. “What can they do, Moiraine? Even if they find him, what can they do?”
“They can bring him to the Tower,” Moiraine replied, putting more confidence into her voice than she felt. “He can be protected here.” She hoped he could. More than the Reds might want him dead or gentled, whatever the Prophecies said. “And educated.” The Dragon Reborn would have to be educated. He would need to know as much of politics as any queen, as much of war as any general. As much of history as any scholar. Verin Sedai said that most mistakes made by rulers came from not knowing history; they acted in ignorance of the mistakes others had made before them. “He can be guided.” That would be the most important of all, to make sure that he made the right decisions.