Sheriam, Beonin and Myrelle gathered at Elaida’s desk, opened one of the lacquered boxes, and began rifling through the papers inside. Elaida kept her recent correspondence and reports there. The box, worked in golden hawks fighting among white clouds in a blue sky, would suddenly shut again every time one of them let go of the lid, until they remembered to hold it open, and the papers themselves changed even as they were being read. Paper truly was ephemeral. Amid vexed tsks and annoyed sighs, the Aes Sedai persevered.
“Here’s a report from Danelle,” Myrelle said, hastily scanning a page. Siuan tried to join them — Danelle, a young Brown, had been part of the cabal that deposed her — but Beonin gave her a sharp frown that sent her back to a corner grumbling to herself. Beonin had returned her attention to the box and its documents before Siuan had taken three steps; the other two women never noticed. Myrelle went right on talking. “She says that Mattin Stepaneos accepts wholeheartedly, Roedran is still trying to take every side, while Alliandre and Tylin want more time to consider their answers. There’s a note here in Elaida’s hand. ‘Press them!’” She clicked her tongue as the report melted into air in her hand. “It did not say about what, but there can be only two possibilities to take in those four.” Mattin Stepaneos was King of Illian and Roedran of Murandy, while Alliandre was Queen of Ghealdan and Tylin of Altara. The subject had to be Rand or the Aes Sedai opposing Elaida.
“At least we know our emissaries still have as good a chance as Elaida’s,” Sheriam said. Of course, Salidar had sent none to Mattin Stepaneos; Lord Brend of the Council of Nine, Sammael, was the true power in Illian. Elayne would have given a pretty to know what Elaida proposed that Sammael was willing to support, or at least let Mattin Stepaneos say that he would support. She was sure the three Aes Sedai would have given as much, but they just went on snatching documents out of the lacquerwork box.
“The arrest warrant for Moiraine, it is still in force,” Beonin said, shaking her head as the sheet in her hand suddenly t
urned to a fat sheaf. “She does not yet know Moiraine is dead.” Grimacing at the pages, she let them fall; they scattered like leaves, and melted into air before settling. “Elaida still means to build herself a palace, too.”
“She would,” Sheriam said dryly. Her hand jerked as she took in what appeared to be a short note. “Shemerin has run away. The Accepted Shemerin.”
All three glanced at Elayne before turning back to the box, which they had to open again. None made any comment on what Sheriam had said.
Elayne very nearly ground her teeth. She and Nynaeve had told them Elaida was reducing Shemerin, a Yellow sister, to the Accepted, but of course they had not believed. An Aes Sedai could be made to do penance, she might be cast out, but she could not be demoted short of stilling. Only, it seemed that Elaida was doing exactly as that, whatever Tower law said. Maybe she was rewriting Tower law.
A number of things they had told these women had not really been believed. Such young women, Accepted, could not know enough of the world to know what could be and what not. Young women were credulous, gullible; they might well see and believe what was not there at all. It was an effort not to stamp her foot. An Accepted took what Aes Sedai wished to hand out and did not ask for what Aes Sedai did not choose to give. Such as apologies. She kept her face smooth and her smoldering inside.
Siuan felt under no such restraints. Most of the time she did not. When the Aes Sedai were not looking at her, she bathed them all in a glower. Of course, if one of the three glanced in her direction, her face became meek acceptance in a twinkling. She was very practiced at that. A lion survives by being a lion, she had once told Elayne, and a mouse by being a mouse. Even so, Siuan made a poor and reluctant mouse.
Elayne thought she detected worry in Siuan’s eyes. This task had been Siuan’s since she proved to the Aes Sedai that she could use the ring safely — after secret lessons for her and Leane from Nynaeve and Elayne, true — and a prime source of information. It took time to reestablish contact with eyes-and-ears scattered across the nations, and redirect their reports from the Tower to Salidar. If Sheriam and the others meant to take this over, Siuan might be less useful. In the history of the Tower no network of agents had ever been run by any but a full sister until Siuan came to Salidar with her knowledge of the Amyrlin’s eyes-and-ears, and the Blue Ajah’s that she had run before becoming Amyrlin. Beonin and Carlinya were openly reluctant to depend on a woman who was no longer one of them, and the others were not far behind. Truth to tell, they were none of them comfortable around a woman who had been stilled.
There really was nothing for Elayne to do, either. The Aes Sedai might call this a lesson, they might even think of it so, but she knew from past experience that if she tried to do any teaching without being asked, she would have her nose snapped off in short order. She was there to answer any questions they might have and nothing more. She thought of a stool — it appeared, the legs carved in vines — and sat down to wait. A chair would have been more comfortable, but it might occasion comment. An Accepted sitting too comfortably was often considered an Accepted with not enough to do. After a moment Siuan made herself an almost identical stool. She gave Elayne a tight smile — and the Aes Sedai backs a scowl.
The first time Elayne had visited this room in Tel’aran’rhiod, there had been a semicircle of such stools, a dozen or more, in front of the heavily carved table. Each visit since had seen fewer, and now none. She was sure that indicated something, though she could not imagine what. She was sure Siuan thought so, too, and very likely had puzzled out a reason, but if she had, she had not shared it with Elayne or Nynaeve.
“The fighting in Shienar and Arafel is dying down,” Sheriam murmured half to herself, “but still nothing here to say why it began. Skirmishes only, yet Bordermen do not fight one another. They have the Blight.” She was Saldaean, and Saldaea was one of the Borderlands.
“At least the Blight is still quiet,” Myrelle said. “Almost too quiet. It cannot last. A good thing that Elaida has plenty of eyes-and-ears through the Borderlands.” Siuan managed to combine a wince with a glare at the Aes Sedai. Elayne did not think she had managed yet to make contact with any of her agents in the Borderlands; they lay a long way from Salidar,
“I would feel better if the same could be said of Tarabon.” The page in Beonin’s hand grew longer and wider; she glanced at it, sniffed, and tossed it aside. “The eyes-and-ears in Tarabon, they are still silent. All of them. The only word she has of Tarabon is rumors from Amadicia that Aes Sedai are involved in the war.” She shook her head at the absurdity of committing such rumors to paper. Aes Sedai did not involve themselves in civil wars. Not openly enough to be detected, at any rate. “And there are no more than a handful of confused reports from Arad Doman, it seems.”
“We will know about Tarabon soon enough ourselves,” Sheriam said soothingly. “A few more weeks.”
The search went on for hours. There was never any shortage of documents; the lacquered box never emptied. In fact, the stack inside sometimes increased with the removal of a paper. Of course, only the shortest held steady long enough to be read in full, but occasionally a letter or report that had already been scanned would come out of the box again. Long stretches passed in silence, yet some documents elicited comment; a few the Aes Sedai discussed. Siuan began stringing a cat’s-cradle between her hands, apparently paying no attention at all. Elayne wished she could do the same, or better yet read — a book appeared on the floor at her feet, The Travels of Jain Farstrider, before she made it go away — but women who were not Aes Sedai were granted more leeway than those training to be. Still, she learned a few things by listening.
Aes Sedai involvement in Tarabon was not the only rumor that had found its way to Elaida’s writing table. Pedron Niall’s ingathering of the Whitecloaks was rumored to have as its goal everything from seizing the throne of Amadicia — which he certainly had no need of — to crushing the wars and anarchy in Tarabon and Arad Doman, to supporting Rand. Elayne would believe that when the sun rose in the west. There were reports of strange occurrences in Illian and Cairhien — there might have been others, but those were the ones they saw — villages taken by madness, nightmares walking in daylight, two-headed calves that talked, Shadowspawn appearing out of thin air. Sheriam and the other two passed over those lightly; the same sort of stories drifted to Salidar from parts of Altara and Murandy and across the river from Amadicia. The Aes Sedai dismissed them as hysteria among people learning of the Dragon Reborn. Elayne was not so sure. She had seen things they had not, for all their years and experience. Her mother was rumored to be raising an army in the west of Andor — under the ancient flag of Manetheren, of all things! — as well as being held prisoner by Rand and fleeing to every nation imaginable, including the Borderlands and Amadicia, which last was purely unimaginable. Apparently the Tower believed none of it. Elayne wished she knew what to believe.
She stopped fretting over where her mother really was when she heard Sheriam mention her name. Not speaking to her; reading hurriedly from a square sheet of paper that became a long parchment with three seals at the bottom. Elayne Trakand was to be located and returned to the White Tower at all costs. If there was any more bungling, those who failed would “envy the Macura woman.” That made Elayne shiver; on their way to Salidar a woman named Ronde Macura had come within an eyelash of sending her and Nynaeve back to the Tower like bundles of wash to the laundry. The ruling house of Andor, Sheriam read, was “the key,” which made as little sense. The key to what?
None of the three Aes Sedai so much as glanced in her direction. They just exchanged glances and went on with what they were doing. Perhaps they had forgotten her, but then again, perhaps not. Aes Sedai did what they did. If she was to be shielded from Elaida, that was an Aes Sedai decision, and if they decided for some reason to hand her to Elaida bound hand and foot, that was their choice too. “The pike does not ask the frog’s permission before dining,” as she remembered Lini saying.
Elaida’s response to Rand’s amnesty was evident in the condition of the report. Elayne could almost see her crumpling the sheet of paper in her fist, starting to rip it apart, then coldly smoothing it out and adding it to the box. Elaida’s rages were almost always cold. She had not written anything on that document, but scrawled biting words on another enumerating the Aes Sedai in the Tower, made clear she was almost ready to declare publicly that any who did not obey her order to return were traitors. Sheriam and the other two discussed the possibility calmly. However many sisters intended to obey, some would have far to travel; some might not even have received the summons yet. In any case, such a decree would confirm to the world all the rumors of a divided Tower. Elaida must be near panic to consider such a thing, or else maddened beyond reason.
A sliver of cold slid down Elayne’s backbone, and nothing to do with whether Elaida was fearful or engaged. Two hundred ninety four Aes Sedai in the Tower, supporting Elaida. Nearly one-third of all Aes Sedai, almost as many as had gathered in Salidar. It might be that the best that could be expected was for the rest to split down the middle as well. After a great rush in the beginning, the numbers coming into Salidar had slowed to a trickle. Perhaps the flow to the Tower had dwindled as well. It could be hoped.
For a time they did their searching in silence, then Beonin exclaimed, “Elaida, she has sent emissaries to Rand al’Thor.” Elayne leaped to her feet, and barely held her tongue at a clutching gesture from Siuan, spoiled a little by her failure to make the cat’s-cradle disappear first.
Sheriam reached for the single sheet, but it became three before her hand touched it. “Where is she sending them?” she asked at the same time Myrelle asked, “When did they leave Tar Va
lon?” Serenity hung on by its fingernails.
“To Cairhien,” Beonin said. “And I did not see when, if it was mentioned. But they certainly will go on to Caemlyn as soon as they discover where he is.”
Even so, that was good; it might take a month or more to travel from Cairhien to Caemlyn. The Salidar embassy would reach him first, surely. Elayne had a ragged map tucked away beneath her mattress back in Salidar, and every day she marked off how far she thought they might have traveled toward Caemlyn. The Gray sister was not finished. “It seems that Elaida, she means to offer him support. And an escort to the Tower.” Sheriam’s eyebrows rose.
“That is preposterous.” Myrelle’s olive cheeks darkened. “Elaida was Red.” An Amyrlin was of all Ajahs and none, yet no one could simply abandon where they came from.
“That woman will do anything,” Sheriam said. “He might find the White Tower’s support attractive.”