Suddenly she was very intent on his beard, smoothing it and not meeting his eyes. She started speaking slowly but picked up speed like a runaway horse. “I … just happened to mention … in passing … I just mentioned to Mistress al’Vere how we had been traveling together—I don’t know how it came up—and she said—and Mistress Congar agreed with her—not that I talked to everybody!—she said that we probably—certainly—could be considered betrothed already under your customs, and the year is just to make sure you really do get on well together—which we do, as anyone can see—and here I am being as forward as some Domani hussy or one of those Tairen galls—if you ever even think of Berelain—oh, Light, I’m babbling, and you won’t even—”
He cut her off by kissing her as thoroughly as he knew how.
“Will you marry me?” he said breathlessly when he was done. “Tonight?” He must have done ever better with the kiss than he thought; he had to repeat himself six times, with her giggling against his throat and demanding he say it again, before she seemed to understand.
Which was how he found himself not half an hour later kneeling opposite her in the common room, in front of Daise Congar and Marin al’Vere, Alsbet Luhhan and Neysa Ayellin and all the Women’s Circle. Loial had been roused to stand for him with Aram, and Bain and Chiad stood for Faile. There were no flowers to put in her hair or his, but Bain, guided by Marin, tucked a long red wedding ribbon around his neck, and Loial threaded another through Faile’s dark hair, his thick fingers surprisingly deft and gentle. Perrin’s hands trembled as he cupped hers.
“I, Perrin Aybara, do pledge you my love, Faile Bashere, for as long as I live.” For as long as I live and after. “What I possess in this world I give to you.” A horse, an axe, a bow. A hammer. Not much to gift a bride. I give you life, my love. It’s all I have. “I will keep and hold you, succor and tend you, protect and shelter you, for all the days of my life.” I can’t keep you; the only way I can protect you is to send you away. “I am yours, always and forever.” By the time he finished, his hands were shaking visibly.
Faile moved her hands to hold his. “I, Zarine Bashere …” That was a surprise; she hated that name. “ … do pledge you my love, Perrin Aybara … .” Her hands never trembled at all.
CHAPTER 54
Into the Palace
Seated on the tail end of the high-wheeled cart trundling up a twisty Tanchican street behind four sweating men, Elayne scowled through the grimy veil that covered her from eyes to chin, kicking her bare feet irritably. Every lurch over the paving stones jarred her to the top of her skull; the more she braced herself by holding on to the rough wooden planks of the cart bed, the worse it was. It did not seem to bother Nynaeve much; she jounced about like Elayne, but, frowning slightly and eyes looking inward, she appeared hardly aware of it. And Egeanin, crowded against Nynaeve on the other side, veiled and with her dark hair in braids to her shoulders, rode each jolt easily; arms folded. Finally Elayne emulated the Seanchan woman; she could not avoid swaying into Nynaeve, but the ride no longer felt as if her lower teeth were going to be driven through the upper.
She would have walked gladly, even barefoot, but Bayle Domon had said it would not look right; people might wonder why women were not riding when there was plenty of room, and the last thing they wanted was anyone thinking about them twice. Of course he was not being bounced about like a sack of turnips; he was walking, at the head of the cart with ten of the twenty sailors he had brought along for escort. More would seem suspicious, he claimed. She suspected he would not have had so many if not for her and the other two women.
The cloudless sky still stretched gray overhead, though first light had crept on before they set out; the streets were still largely empty, and silent except for the rumble of the cart and the creak of its axle. When the sun topped the horizon people would begin to venture out, but now the few she saw were knots of men in baggy trousers and dark cylindrical caps, scuttling along with the furtive air of having been up to no go
od while dark had held. The old piece of canvas tossed over the cart’s load was carefully arranged so anyone could see it covered only three large baskets, yet even so one or another of those small clusters would pause like a pack of dogs, veiled faces all coming up together, eyes swiveling to follow the cart. Apparently twenty men with boarding swords and cudgels were too many to face, because all eventually hurried on.
The wheels dropped into a large hole where paving stones had been pried up in one of the riots; the cart fell away beneath her. She almost bit her tongue as she and the cart bed met again with a hard smack. Egeanin and her casual arm-folding! Grabbing the edge of the cart bed, she frowned at the Seanchan woman. And found her tight-lipped and holding on with both hands also.
“Not quite the same as standing on deck after all,” Egeanin said with a shrug.
Nynaeve grimaced slightly and tried to edge away from the Seanchan woman, though how she might manage it without climbing into Elayne’s lap was difficult to see. “I am going to speak to Master Bayle Domon,” she muttered meaningfully, just as if the cart had not been her suggestion in the first place. Another lurch clicked her teeth shut.
They all three wore drab brown wool, thin-woven but coarse and not very clean, poor farm women’s dresses like shapeless sacks compared with the clinging silks of Rendra’s taste. Refugees from the countryside earning a meal as they could; that was what they were supposed to be. Egeanin’s relief at her first sight of the dresses had been quite evident, and almost as strange as her presence on the cart. Elayne would not have thought the latter conceivable.
There had been quite a lot of discussion—that was what the men called it—in the Chamber of Falling Blossoms, but she and Nynaeve had countered most of their fool objections and ignored the rest. The two of them had to enter the Panarch’s Palace, and as soon as possible. That was when Domon had raised another objection, one not as silly as the rest.
“You can no go into the palace alone,” the bearded smuggler muttered, staring at his fists on the table. “You say you will no channel unless you must, no to warn these Black Aes Sedai.” Neither of them had seen any need to mention one of the Forsaken. “Then you must have muscle to swing a club if the need do arise, and eyes to watch your backs will no be amiss either. I am known there, to the servants. I did take gifts to the old Panarch too. I will go with you.” Shaking his head, he growled, “You do make me stretch my neck on the headsman’s block because I did leave you at Falme. Fortune prick me if you do no! Well, it do be done now; you can no object to this! I will go in with you.”
“You are a fool, Illianer,” Juilin said contemptuously before she or Nynaeve could open their mouths. “You think the Taraboners will allow you to wander about the palace as you wish? A scruffy smuggler from Illian? I know the ways of servants, how to duck my head and make some empty-headed noble think … .” He cleared his throat hastily, and hurried on without looking at Nyaneve—or at her! “I should be the one to go with them.”
Thom laughed at the other two men. “Do you think either of you could pass for a Taraboner? I can; these will do in a pinch.” He knuckled his long mustaches. “Besides, you cannot run around the Panarch’s Palace carrying cudgel or staff. A more … subtle … method of protection is needed.” He flourished a hand, and a knife suddenly appeared, spinning through his fingers to vanish just as quickly; up his sleeve, Elayne believed.
“You all know what you have to do,” Nynaeve snapped, “and you cannot do it trying to watch over us like a pair of geese for market!” Taking a deep breath, she went on, in a milder tone. “If there was a way one of you could come along, I’d appreciate the extra eyes if nothing else, but it cannot be. We have to go alone, it seems, and that is all there is to it.”
“I can accompany you,” Egeanin announced suddenly from where Nynaeve had made her stand in the corner of the room. Everybody turned to look at her; she frowned back as though not quite certain herself. “These women are Darkfriends. They should be brought to justice.”
Elayne was simply startled at the offer, but Nynaeve, the corners of her mouth going white, looked ready to drub the woman for it. “You think we would trust you, Seanchan?” she said coldly. “Before we leave, you’ll be locked securely in a storeroom however much talk it—”
“I give oath by my hope of a higher name,” Egeanin broke in, putting her hands over her heart, one atop the other, “that I will not betray you in any way, that I will obey you and guard your backs until you are safely out of the Panarch’s Palace.” Then she bowed three times, deeply and formally. Elayne had no idea what “hope of a higher name” meant, but the Seanchan woman certainly made it sound binding.
“She can do it,” Domon said with slow reluctance. He eyed Egeanin and shook his head. “Fortune prick me if there be more than two or three of my men I would wager on, coin for coin, against her.”
Nynaeve frowned at her hand gripping half a dozen of her long braids, then quite deliberately gave them a yank.
“Nynaeve,” Elayne told her firmly, “you yourself said you would like another pair of eyes, and I definitely would. Besides which, if we are to do this without channeling, I would not mind having someone along who can handle a nosy guard if need be. I am not up to thumping men with my fists, and neither are you. You remember how she can fight.”
Nynaeve glared at Egeanin, frowned at Elayne, and then stared at the men as if they had plotted this behind her back. At last, though, she nodded.
“Good,” Elayne said. “Master Domon, that means three sets of dresses, not two. Now, the three of you had best be off. We want to be on our way by daybreak.”
The cart jerking to a halt brought Elayne out of her reverie.