Towers of Midnight

24 To Make a Stand

“Bed rest,” Melfane announced, taking her ear from the wooden tube she’d placed against Elayne’s chest. The midwife was a short, ample-cheeked woman who today wore her hair tied back by a translucent blue scarf. Her neat dress was of white and matching sky-blue, as if worn in defiance of the perpetually overcast sky.

“What?” Elayne asked.

“One week,” Melfane said, wagging a thick finger at Elayne. “You aren’t to be on your feet for one week.”

Elayne blinked, stunned, her exhaustion fleeing for the moment. Melfane smiled cheerfully as she consigned Elayne to this impossible punishment. Bed rest? For a week?

Birgitte stood in the doorway, Mat in the room beyond. He’d stepped out for Melfane’s inspection, but otherwise he’d hovered near her almost as protectively as Birgitte. You’d never know they cared for her by the way they spoke, however—the two of them had been sharing curses, each trying to top the other. Elayne had learned a few new ones. Who knew that hundred-legs did those things?

Her babes were safe, so far as Melfane could tell. That was the important part. “Bed rest is, of course, impossible,” Elayne said. “I have far too much to do.”

“Well, it will have to be done from bed,” Melfane replied, her voice pleasant but completely unyielding. “Your body and your child have undergone a great stress. They need time to recover. I will be attending you and making certain you maintain a strict diet.”

“But—”

“I won’t hear any excuses,” Melfane interrupted.

“I’m the Queen!” Elayne said, exasperated.

“And I’m the Queen’s midwife,” Melfane replied, still calm. “There isn’t a soldier or attendant in this palace who won’t help me, if I determine that your health—and that of your child—is at risk.” She met Elayne’s eyes. “Would you like to put my words to the test, Your Majesty?”

Elayne cringed, imagining her own Guards forbidding her exit to her chambers. Or, worse, tying her down. She glanced at Birgitte, but received only a satisfied nod. “It’s no more than you deserve,” that nod seemed to say.

Elayne sat back in her bed, frustrated. It was a massive four-poster, decorated in red and white. The room was ornate, sparkling with various creations of crystal and ruby. It would make a beautifully gilded prison indeed. Light! This wasn’t fair! She did up the front of her gown.

“I see that you’re not going to try my word,” Melfane said, standing up from the side of the bed. “You show wisdom.” She glanced at Birgitte. “I will allow you a meeting with the Captain-General to assess the evening’s events. But no more than a half-hour, mind you. I won’t have you exerting yourself!”

“But—”

Melfane wagged that finger at her again. “A half-hour, Your Majesty. You are a woman, not a plow beast. You need rest and care.” She turned to Birgitte. “Do not upset her unduly.”

“I wouldn’t dream of it,” Birgitte said. Her anger was finally beginning to abate, replaced by amusement. Insufferable woman.

Melfane withdrew to the outer chamber. Birgitte remained where she was, regarding Elayne through narrow eyes. Some displeasure still boiled and churned from the bond. The two regarded one another for a long moment.

“What are we do to with you, Elayne Trakand?” Birgitte finally asked.

“Lock me in my bedroom, it appears,” Elayne snapped. “Not a bad solution.”

“And would you keep me here forever?” Elayne asked. “Like Gelfina, from the stories, locked away for a thousand years in the forgotten tower?” Birgitte sighed. “No. But six months or so would help keep my anxiety levels down.”

“We don’t have time for that,” Elayne replied. “We don’t have time for much, these days. Risks must be taken.”

“Risks involving the Queen of Andor going alone to face a mob of the Black Ajah? You’re like some blood-besotted idiot on the battlefield, charging ahead of his comrades, seeking death without a shield-mate to guard your back!”

Elayne blinked at the anger in the woman.

“Don’t you trust me, Elayne?” Birgitte asked. “Would you be rid of me, if you could?”

“What? No! Of course I trust you.”

“Then why won’t you let me help you? I’m not supposed to be here, now. I have no purpose other than what circumstance has given me. You made me your Warder, but you won’t let me protect you! How can I be your bodyguard if you won’t tell me when you’re putting yourself in danger?”

Elayne felt like pulling the covers up to shield herself from those eyes. How could Birgitte be the one who felt so hurt? Elayne had been the one who’d been wounded! “If it means anything,” she said, “I don’t intend to do this again.”

“No. You’ll do something else reckless.”

“I mean, I intend to be more careful. Maybe you’re right, and the viewing isn’t a perfect guarantee. It certainly didn’t stop me from panicking when I felt a real danger.”

“You didn’t feel a real danger when the Black Ajah locked you up and tried to cart you away?”

Elayne hesitated. She should have been frightened that time, but she hadn’t been. Not only because of Min’s viewing. The Black Ajah would never have killed her, not under those circumstances. She was too valuable.

Feeling that knife enter her side, pierce her skin, dig toward her womb… that had been different. The terror. She could remember the world blackening around her, her heartbeat thudding, growing louder, like the drumbeats at the end of a performance. The ones that came before the silence.

Birgitte regarded Elayne appraisingly. She could feel Elayne’s emotions. She was Queen. She could not avoid risks. But… perhaps she could rein herself in.

“Well,” Birgitte said, “did you at least discover anything?”

“I did,” Elayne said. “I—”

At that moment, a scarf-wrapped head appeared in the doorway. Mat had his eyes closed. “You covered up?”

“Yes,” Elayne said. “And in a far more fashionable way than you, Matrim Cauthon. That scarf looks ridiculous.”

He scowled, opening his eyes and pulling off the scarf, revealing the angular face beneath. “You try moving through the city without being recognized,” he said. “Every butcher, innkeeper and bloody backroom slipfinger seems to know what I look like these days.”

“The Black sisters were planning to have you assassinated,” Elayne said.

“What?” Mat asked.

Elayne nodded. “One mentioned you. It sounded like Darkfriends had been searching for you for some time, with the intent of killing you.”

Birgitte shrugged. “They’re Darkfriends. No doubt they want us all dead.”

“This was different,” Elayne said. “It seemed more… intense. I suggest keeping your wits about you the next while.”

“That’ll be a trick,” Birgitte noted. “Seeing as to how he doesn’t have any wits in the first place.”

Mat rolled his eyes. “Did I miss you explaining what you were doing in the flaming dungeons, sitting in a pool of your own blood, looking for all the world like you’d seen the losing end of a battlefield skirmish?”

“I was interrogating the Black Ajah,” Elayne said. “The details are none of your concern. Birgitte, have you a report from the grounds?”

“Nobody saw Mellar leave,” the Warder said. “Though we found the secretary’s body on the ground floor, still warm. Died from a knife to the back.”

Elayne sighed. “Shiaine?”

“Gone,” Birgitte said, “along with Marillin Gemalphin and Falion Bhoda.”

“The Shadow couldn’t leave them in our possession,” Elayne said with a sigh. “They know too much. They had to end up either rescued or executed.”

“Well,” Mat said, shrugging, “you’re alive, and three of them are dead. Seems like a reasonably good outcome.”

But the ones who escaped have a copy of your medallion, Elayne thought. She didn’t speak it, however. She also didn’t mention the invasion that Chesmal had spoken of. She would talk of it with Birgitte soon, of course, but first she wanted to consider it herself.

Mat had said the night’s events had a “reasonably good outcome.” But the more Elayne thought about it, the more dissatisfied she was. An invasion of Andor was coming, but she didn’t know when. The Shadow wanted Mat dead, but as Birgitte had pointed out, that was no surprise. In fact, the only certain result of the evening’s adventures was the sense of fatigue Elayne felt. That and a week confined to her rooms.

“Mat,” she said, taking off his medallion. “Here, it’s time I gave this back. You should know that it probably saved my life tonight.”

He walked over and took it back eagerly, then hesitated. “Were you able to…”

“Copy it? Not perfectly. But to an extent.”

He put it back on, looking concerned. “Well, that feels good to have back. I’ve been wanting to ask you something. Now might not be the time.”

“Speak of it,” Elayne said, tired. “Might as well.”

“Well, it’s about the gholam…”

“The city has been emptied of most civilians,” Yoeli said as he and Ituralde walked through Maradon’s gate. “We’re close to the Blight; this is not the first time we’ve evacuated. My own sister, Sigril, leads the Lastriders, who will watch from the ridge to the southeast and send word if we should we fall. She will have sent word to our watchposts around Saldaea, requesting aid. She will light a watchfire to alert us if they come.”

The lean-faced man looked at Ituralde, his expression grim. “There will be few troops who could come to our aid. Queen Tenobia took many with her when she rode to find the Dragon Reborn.”

Ituralde nodded. He walked without a limp—Antail, one of the Asha’man, was quite skilled with Healing. His men made a hasty camp in the courtyard just inside the city gates. The Trollocs had taken the tents they’d left behind, then lit them on fire at night to illuminate them feasting on the wounded. Ituralde had moved some of his troops into the empty buildings, but he wanted others close to the gate in case of an assault.

The Asha’man and Aes Sedai had worked to Heal Ituralde’s men, but only the worst cases could get attention. Ituralde nodded to Antail, who was working with the wounded in a roped-off section of the square. Antail didn’t see the nod. He concentrated, sweating, working with a Power Ituralde didn’t want to think about.

“Are you certain you want to see them?” Yoeli asked. He held a horsemans long spear on his shoulder, the tip tied with a triangular black and yellow pendant. It was called the Traitor’s Banner by the Saldaeans here.

The city bristled with hostility, different groups of Saldaeans regarding one another with grim expressions. Many wore strips of black cloth and yellow cloth twisted about one another and tied to their sword sheaths. They nodded to Yoeli.

Desya gavane cierto cuendar isain carentin, Ituralde thought. A phrase in the Old Tongue. It meant “A resolute heart is worth ten arguments.” He could guess what that banner meant. Sometimes a man knew what he must do, though it sounded wrong. The two of them walked for a time through the streets. Maradon was like most Borderland cities: straight walls, square buildings, narrow streets. The houses looked like fortressed keeps, with small windows and sturdy doors. The streets wound in odd ways, and there were no thatched roofs—only slate shingles, fireproof. The dried blood at several key intersections was difficult to make out against the dark stone, but Ituralde knew what to look for. Yoeli’s rescue of his troops had come after fighting among the Saldaeans.

They reached a nondescript building. There would be no way for an outsider to know that this particular dwelling belonged to Vram Torkumen, distant cousin to the Queen, appointed lord of the city in her absence. The soldiers at the door wore yellow and black. They saluted Yoeli.

Inside, Ituralde and Yoeli entered a narrow staircase and climbed three flights of stairs. There were soldiers in nearly every room. On the top floor, four men wearing the Traitor’s Banner guarded a large, gold-inlaid door. The hallway was dark: narrow windows, a rug of black, green and red.

“Anything to report, Tarran?” Yoeli asked.

“Not a thing, sir,” the man said with a salute. He wore long mustaches and had the bowed legs of a man very comfortable in the saddle.

Yoeli nodded. “Thank you, Tarran. For all you do.”

“I stand with you, sir. And will at the end.”

“May you keep your eyes northward, but your heart southward, my friend,” Yoeli said, taking a deep breath and pushing open the door. Ituralde followed.

Inside the room, a Saldaean man in a rich red robe sat beside a hearth, sipping a cup of wine. A woman in a fine dress did needlework in the chair across from him. Neither looked up.

“Lord Torkumen,” Yoeli said. “This is Rodel Ituralde, leader of the Domani army.”

The man at the hearth sighed over his cup of wine. “You do not knock, you do not wait for me to address you first, you come during an hour when have spoken of my need for quiet contemplation.”

“Really, Vram,” the woman said, “you expect manners from this man? Now?”

Yoeli quietly rested his hand on the hilt of his sword. The room held a jumble of furniture: a bed on the side of the room that obviously didn’t belong there, a few trunks and standing wardrobes.

“So,” Vram said, “Rodel Ituralde. You’re one of the great captains. I realize it might be insulting to ask, but I must observe formalities. You realize that by bringing troops onto our soil, you have risked a war?”

“I serve the Dragon Reborn,” Ituralde said. “Tarmon Gai’don comes and all previous allegiances, boundaries, and laws are subject to the Dragon’s will.”

Vram clicked his tongue. “Dragonsworn. I had reports, of course—and those men you employ seemed an obvious hint. But it is still so strange to hear. Do you not realize how utterly foolish you sound?”

Ituralde met the man’s eyes. He hadn’t considered himself Dragonsworn, but there was no use calling a horse a rock and expecting everyone else to agree. “Don’t you care about the invading Trollocs?”

“There have been Trollocs before,” Vram said. “There have always been Trollocs.”

“The Queen—” Yoeli said.

“The Queen,” Vram interrupted, “will soon return from her expedition to unmask and capture this false Dragon. Once that happens, she will see you executed, traitor. You, Rodel Ituralde, will likely be spared because of your station, but I should not like to be your family when they receive the ransom demand. I hope that you have wealth to accompany your reputation. Otherwise, you shall likely spend many of the next years as a general to nothing more than the rats of your cell.”

“I see,” Ituralde said. “When did you turn to the Shadow?”

Vram’s eyes opened wide, and he stood. “You dare name me Darkfriend?”

“I’ve known some Saldaeans in my time,” Ituralde said. “I’ve called some friends; I’ve fought against others. But never have I known one who would watch men fight Shadowspawn and not offer to help.”

“If I had a sword…” Vram said.

“May you burn, Vram Torkumen,” Ituralde said. “I came here to tell you that that, on behalf of the men I lost.”

The man seemed shocked as Ituralde turned to go. Yoeli joined him, pulling the door closed.

“You disagree with my accusation?” Ituralde asked, joining the traitor as they returned to the stairs.

“I honestly can’t decide if he’s a fool or a Darkfriend,” Yoeli said. “He’d have to be one or the other to not put together the truth from the winter, those clouds and the rumors that al’Thor has conquered half the world.”

“Then you have nothing to fear,” Ituralde said. “You won’t be executed.”

“I killed my countrymen,” Yoeli said, “staged a revolt against my Queen’s appointed leader, and seized command of the city, though I’ve not a drop of noble blood.”

“That’ll change the moment Tenobia returns, I warrant,” Ituralde said. “You’ve earned yourself a title for certain.”

Yoeli stopped in the dark stairwell, lit only from above and below. “I see that you do not understand. I have betrayed my oaths and killed friends. I will demand execution, as is my right.”

Ituralde felt a chill. Bloody Borderlanders, he thought. “Swear yourself to the Dragon. He supersedes all oaths. Do not waste your life. Fight beside me at the Last Battle.”

“I will not hide behind excuses, Lord Ituralde,” the man said, continuing down the steps. “No more than I could watch your men die. Come. Let us see to the housing of those Asha’man. I would like very much to see these ‘gateways’ you speak of. If we could use them to send messages out and bring supplies in, this could be a very interesting siege indeed.”

Ituralde sighed, but followed. They didn’t speak of fleeing by way of the gateways. Yoeli wouldn’t abandon his city. And, he realized, Ituralde wouldn’t abandon Yoeli and his men. Not after what they’d gone through to rescue him.

This was as good a place as any to make a stand. Better than many a situation he’d been in lately, that was for certain.

Perrin entered their tent to find Faile brushing her hair. She was beautiful. Each day, he still felt a sense of wonder that she was really back.

She turned to him and smiled in satisfaction. She was using the new silver comb he’d left on her pillow—something he’d traded for from Gaul, who had found it in Maiden. If this shanna’har was important to her, then Perrin intended to treat it the same way.

“The messengers have returned,” Perrin said, closing the flaps to the tent. “The Whitecloaks have chosen a battlefield. Light, Faile. They’re going to force me to wipe them out.”

“I don’t see the trouble with that,” she said. “We’ll win.”

“Probably,” Perrin said, sitting down on the pillows beside their sleeping pallet. “But despite the Asha’man doing most of the work at first, we’ll have to move in to fight. That means we’ll lose people. Good men we need at the Last Battle.” He forced himself to relax the fists that he’d clenched.

“The Light burn those Whitecloaks for what they’ve done, and for what they’re doing.”

“Then it’s a welcome opportunity to defeat them.”

Perrin grunted a reply, and didn’t explain the depth of frustration he felt. He would lose that fight against the Whitecloaks, no matter what happened. Men would die on both sides. Men they needed.

The lightning flashed outside, casting shadows on the canvas ceiling. Faile went over to their trunk, getting out a sleeping shift for herself and setting aside a robe for him. Faile thought a lord should have a robe handy in case he was needed at night. She’d been correct a couple of times so far.

She moved past him, smelling worried, though her expression was pleasant. He had expended all options for a peaceful resolution with the Whitecloaks. It looked like, want it or not, killing would be his lot again very soon.

He stripped to his smallclothes and lay down, then started drifting off before Faile had finished changing.

He entered the wolf dream beneath the great sword impaling the ground. In the distance, he could make out the hill that Gaul had named a “fine watchpoint.” The campsite was supplied from behind by a stream.

Perrin turned and sped toward the Whitecloak camp. They sat like a dam in a river, stopping him from continuing onward.

“Hopper?” he called, looking around the Whitecloak camp, still tents standing on an open field. There was no response, so Perrin searched the camp a while longer. Balwer had not recognized the seal Perrin had described. Who led these Whitecloaks?

An hour or so later, Perrin had come to no conclusion about that. However, he was fairly certain which tents they kept their supplies in; those might not be as well guarded as the prisoners, and—with gateways—he might be able to burn their supplies.

Maybe. Their Lord Captain Commander’s letters were filled with phrases like: “I am giving your people the benefit of believing they knew not of your nature” and “My patience for your delays wears thin” and “There are only two options. Surrender yourself for proper trial, or bring your army to suffer the Light’s judgment.”

There was a strange sense of honor to this man, one Perrin had seen hinted at when he’d met the man, but could sense even more through the letters. But who was he? He signed each letter only “Lord Captain Commander of the Children of the Light.”

Perrin moved out onto the roadway. Where was Hopper? Perrin took off at a brisk run. After a few moments, he moved off onto the grass. The earth was so soft, each step seemed to spring his foot back up into the air. He reached out and thought he sensed something to the south. He ran toward it; he wished to go faster, so he did. Trees and hills zipped past. The wolves were aware of him. It was Oak Dancer’s pack, with Boundless, Sparks, Morninglight, and others. Perrin could feel them sending to one another, distant whispers of images and scent. Perrin moved faster, feeling the wind become a roar around him. The wolves began to move away farther south. Wait! he sent. I must meet with you!

They returned only amusement. Suddenly, they were heading east, and he pulled to a stop, then turned. He ran as quickly as he knew how, but when he got near, they were suddenly elsewhere. They’d shifted, vanishing from the south and appearing north of him.

Perrin growled, and suddenly he was on all fours. His fur blew, his mouth open as he dashed to the north, drinking in the hissing wind. But the wolves stayed ahead, distant.

He howled. They sent back taunts.

He pushed himself faster, leaping from hilltop to hilltop, bounding over trees, the ground a blur. In moments, the Mountains of Mist sprang up to his left, and he passed along them in a rush.

The wolves turned east. Why couldn’t he catch them? He could smell them ahead. Young Bull howled at them, but got no response.

Do not come too strongly, Young Bull.

Young Bull pulled to a halt and the world lurched around him. The main pack continued on to the east, but Hopper sat on his haunches beside a large curving stream. Young Bull had been here before; it was near the den of his sires. He had traveled along the river itself on the back of one of the humans’ floating trees. He— No… no… remember Faile!

His fur became clothing and he found himself on hands and knees. He glared at Hopper. “Why did you run away?” Perrin demanded.

You wish to learn, Hopper sent. You grow more skilled. Faster. You stretch your legs and run. This is good.

Perrin looked back the way he had come, thinking of his speed. He’d bounded from hilltop to hilltop. It had been wonderful. “But I had to become the wolf to do that,” Perrin said. “And that threatened to make me here too strongly. What use is training if it makes me do things you’ve forbidden?”

You are quick to blame, Young Bull. A young wolf howling and yapping outside the den, making a racket. This is not a thing of wolves.

Hopper was gone in an eyeblink.

Perrin growled, looking eastward, where he sensed the wolves. He took off after them, going more cautiously. He couldn’t afford to let the wolf consume him. He’d end up like Noam, trapped in a cage, his humanity gone. Why would Hopper encourage him to that?

This is not a thing of wolves. Had he meant the accusations, or had he meant what was happening to Perrin?

The others all knew to end the hunt, Young Bull, Hopper sent from a distance. Only you had to be stopped.

Perrin froze, pulling to a halt on the bank of the river. The hunt for the white stag. Hopper was there, suddenly, beside the river with him.

“This started when I began to sense the wolves,” Perrin sent. “The first time I lost control of myself was with those Whitecloaks.”

Hopper lay down, resting his head on his paws. You often are here too strongly, the wolf sent. It is what you do.

Hopper had told him that, off and on, since he’d known the wolf and the wolf dream. But suddenly, Perrin saw a new meaning to it. It was about coming to the wolf dream, but it was also about Perrin himself.

He’d begun to blame the wolves for what he did, the way he was when fighting, the way he’d become when searching for Faile. But were the wolves the cause of that? Or was it some part of him? Was it possible that that was what caused him to become a wolfbrother in the first place?

“Is it possible,” Perrin said, “to run on four legs, but not come here too strongly?”

Of course it is, Hopper sent, laughing after the way of wolves—as if what Perrin had discovered was the most obvious thing in the world. Maybe it was.

Perhaps he wasn’t like the wolves because he was a wolfbrother. Perhaps he was a wolfbrother because he was like the wolves. He didn’t need to control them. He needed to control himself.

“The pack,” Perrin said. “How do I catch them? Move more quickly?

That is one way. Another is to be where you want.

Perrin frowned. Then he closed his eyes and used the direction the wolves were running to guess where they would be. Something shifted.

When he opened his eyes, he was standing on a sandy hillside, tufts of long-bladed grass peeking out of the soil. An enormous mountain with a broken tip—shattered as if it had been slapped by the hand of a giant—rose to his right.

A pack of wolves burst out of the forest. Many of them were laughing—Young Bull, hunting when he should seek the end! Young Bull, seeking the end when he should enjoy the hunt! He smiled, trying to feel good captured about the laughter, though in truth he felt much as he had on the day that his cousin Wil had planted a bucket of wet feathers to drop on Perrin.

Something fluttered in the air. A chicken feather. Wet around the edges.

Perrin started, realizing that they were spread around him on the ground. As he blinked, they vanished. The wolves smelled greatly amused, sending images of Young Bull dusted with feathers.

Get lost in dreams here, Young Bull, Hopper sent, and those dreams become this dream.

Perrin scratched his beard, fighting down his embarrassment. He’d experienced before the unpredictable nature of the wolf dream. “Hopper,” he said, turning to the wolf. “How much could I change about my surroundings, if I wanted?”

If you wanted? Hopper said. It’s not about what you want, Young Bull. It’s about what you need. What you know.

Perrin frowned. Sometimes the wolf’s meanings still confused him.

Suddenly, the other wolves in the group turned—as if one—and looked to the southwest. They vanished.

They went here. Hopper sent an image of a distant wooded hollow. The wolf prepared to follow.

“Hopper!” Perrin said, stepping forward. “How did you know? Where they went? Did they tell you?”

No. But I can follow.

“How?” Perrin said.

It is a thing I’ve always known, Hopper sent. Like walking. Or jumping.

“Yes, but how?”

The wolf smelled confused. It is a scent, he finally replied, though “scent” was much more complex than that. It was a feeling, an impression, and a smell all in one.

“Go somewhere,” Perrin said. “Let me try to follow.”

Hopper vanished. Perrin walked up to where the wolf had been.

Smell it, Hopper sent distantly. He was near enough to give a sending, By reflex, Perrin reached out. He found dozens of wolves. In fact, he was amazed by how many of them were here, on the slopes of Dragonmount. Perrin had never felt so many gathered in one place before. Why were they here? And did the sky look more stormy in this place than it had in other areas of the wolf dream?

He couldn’t sense Hopper; the wolf had closed himself off, somehow, making Perrin unable to place where he was. Perrin settled down. Smell it, Hopper had sent. Smell it how? Perrin closed his eyes and let his nose catch the scents of the area to him. Pine cones and sap, quills and leaves, leather-leaf and hemlock.

And… something else. Yes, he could smell something. A distant, lingering scent that seemed out of place. Many of the scents were the same—the same fecund sense of nature, the same wealth of trees. But those were mixed with the scents of moss and of wet stone. The air was different. Pollen and flowers.

Perrin squeezed his eyes tight, breathing in deeply. Somehow, he built a picture in his mind from those scents. The process was not unlike the way a wolf sending translated into words.

There, he thought. Something shifted.

He opened his eyes. He was sitting on a stone outcropping amid pines; he was on the side of Dragonmount, several hours’ hike up from where he had been. The stone outcropping was covered in lichen, and it jutted out over the trees spreading below. A patch of violet springbreath grew here, where sunlight could reach the blossoms. It was good to see flowers that weren’t wilted or dying, if only in the wolf dream.

Come, Hopper sent. Follow.

And he was gone.

Perrin closed his eyes, breathing in. The process was easier this time. Oak and grass, mud and humidity. It seemed each place had its own specific scent.

Perrin shifted, then opened his eyes. He crouched in a field near the Jehannah Road. This was where Oak Dancer’s pack had gone earlier, and Hopper moved about the meadow, smelling curious. The pack had moved on, but they were still close.

“Can I always do that?” Perrin asked Hopper. “Smell where a wolf went in the dream?”

Anyone can, Hopper said. If they can smell as a wolf does. He grinned.

Perrin nodded thoughtfully.

Hopper loped back across the meadow toward him. We must practice, Young Bull You are still a cub with short legs and soft fur. We— Hopper froze suddenly.

“What?” Perrin asked.

A wolf suddenly howled in pain. Perrin spun. It was Morninglight. The howl cut off, and the wolf’s mind winked out, vanishing.

Hopper growled, his scents panicked, angry, and sorrowful.

“What was that?” Perrin demanded.

We are hunted. Go, Young Bull! We must go.

The minds of the other members of the pack leaped away. Perrin growled. When a wolf died in the wolf dream, it was forever. No rebirth, no running with nose to the wind. Only one thing hunted the spirits of the wolves. Slayer.

Young Bull! Hopper sent. We must go!

Perrin continued to growl. Morninglight had sent one last burst of surprise and pain, her last vision of the world. Perrin formed an image from that jumble. Then closed his eyes.

Young Bull! No! He— Shift. Perrin snapped his eyes open to find himself in a small glade near where—in the real world—his people made camp. A muscular, tanned man with dark hair and blue eyes squatted in the center of the glade, a wolf’s corpse at his feet. Slayer was a thick-armed man, and his scent was faintly inhuman, like a man mixed with stone. He wore dark clothing; leather and black wool. As Perrin watched, Slayer began to skin the corpse.

Perrin charged forward. Slayer looked up in surprise. He resembled Lan in an almost eerie fashion, his hard face all angles and sharp lines. Perrin roared, hammer suddenly in his hands.

Slayer vanished in a blink of an eye, and Perrin’s hammer passed through empty air. Perrin breathed deeply. The scents were there! Brine, and wood, wet with water. Seagulls and their droppings. Perrin used his newfound skill to hurl himself at that distant location.

Shift.

Perrin appeared on an empty dock in a city he didn’t recognize. Slayer stood nearby, inspecting his bow.

Perrin attacked. Slayer brought his head up, eyes widening, his scent growing amazed. He raised the bow to block, but Perrin’s swing shattered it.

With a roar, Perrin pulled his weapon back and swung again, this time for Slayer’s head. Oddly, Slayer smiled, dark eyes glittering with amusement. He smelled eager, suddenly. Eager to kill. A sword appeared in his raised hand, and he twisted it to block Perrin’s blow.

The hammer bounced off too hard, as if it had hit stone. Perrin stumbled, and Slayer reached out, placing a hand against Perrin’s shoulder. He shoved.

His strength was immense. The shove tossed Perrin backward to the dock, but the wood disappeared as he hit. Perrin passed through empty air and splashed into the water beneath. His bellow became a gurgle; dark liquid surrounded him.

He struggled to swim upward, dropping his hammer, but found that the surface inexplicably became ice. Ropes snaked up from the depths, whipping up around Perrin’s arms, yanking him downward. Through the frozen surface above, he could see a shadow moving. Slayer, raising his reformed bow.

The ice vanished and the water parted. Water streamed off Perrin, and he found himself staring up at arrow pointed directly at his heart.

Slayer released.

Perrin willed himself away.

Shift. He gasped, hitting the stone outcropping where he had been with Hopper. Perrin fell to his knees, seawater streaming from his body He sputtered, wiping his face, heart pounding.

Hopper appeared beside him, panting, his scent angry. Foolish cub! Stupid cub! Chase down a lion when you’re barely weaned?

Perrin shivered and sat up. Would Slayer follow? Could he? As minutes stretched and nobody appeared, Perrin began to relax. The exchange with Slayer had happened so quickly that it felt like a blur. That strength… it was more than any man could have. And the ice, the ropes…

“He changed things,” Perrin said. “Made the dock vanish beneath me, created ropes to bind me, pushed the water back so that he could get a clear shot at me.”

He is a lion. He kills. Dangerous.

“I need to learn. I must face him, Hopper.”

You are too young. These things are beyond you.

“Too young?” Perrin said, standing. “Hopper, the Last Hunt is nearly upon us!”

Hopper lay down, head on paws.

“You always tell me that I’m too young,” Perrin said. “Or that I don’t know what I’m doing. Well, what is the point of teaching me, if not to show me how to fight men like Slayer?”

We will see, Hopper sent. For tonight, you will go. We are done.

Perrin sensed a mournful cast to the sending, and also a finality. Tonight, Oak Dancer’s pack and Hopper would grieve for Morninglight.

Sighing, Perrin sat with his legs crossed. He concentrated, and managed to imitate the things that Hopper had done in tossing him from the dream.

It faded around him.

He woke on the pallet in his darkened tent, Faile snuggled up beside him—Perrin lay for a time, staring up at the canvas. The darkness reminded him of the tempestuous sky in the wolf dream. Sleep seemed as far off as Caemlyn. Eventually he rose—carefully extricating himself from Faile—and pulled on his trousers and shirt.

The camp was dark outside, but there was enough light for his eyes. He nodded to Kenly Maerin and Jaim Dawtry, the Two Rivers men who guarded his tent tonight.

“What’s the time?” he asked one of them.

“After midnight, Lord Perrin,” Jaim said.

Perrin grunted. Distant lightning lit the landscape. He walked off, and the men started to follow. “I’ll be fine without guards,” he told them. “Watch over my tent—Lady Faile still sleeps.”

His tent was near the edge of camp. He liked that; it gave him a little more sense of seclusion, nestled near the hillside at the western side of the camp. Though it was late, he passed Gaul sharpening his spear near a fallen log. The tall Stone Dog stood up and began to follow, and Perrin didn’t dismiss him. Gaul felt he hadn’t been fulfilling his self-appointed duty of watching after Perrin lately, and had stepped up his efforts. Perrin thought he really just wanted an excuse to stay away from his own tent and the pair of gai’shain women who had taken up residence there.

Gaul kept his distance, and Perrin was glad. Was this how all leaders felt? No wonder so many nations ended up at war with one another—their leaders never had any time to think by themselves, and probably attacked to get people to stop pestering them!

A short distance away, he entered a stand of trees with a small pile of logs. Denton—his serving man until they got Lamgwin back—had frowned when Perrin had asked for them. Once a minor lord of Cairhien, Denton had refused to return to his station. He thought of himself as a servant now, and would not let anyone convince him otherwise.

There was an axe. Not the deadly half-moon blade he had once carried to battle, but a sturdy woodsman’s axe with a fine steel head and a haft smoothed by the sweaty hands of workers. Perrin rolled up his sleeves, then spat on his hands and picked up the axe. It felt good to hold the worked wood in his hands. He raised it to his shoulder, stood the first log in front of him, then stepped back and swung.

He hit the log straight on, splinters flipping into the dark night air, the log railing into two pieces. He split one of the halves next. Gaul took a seat beside a tree, getting out a spear and continuing to sharpen its head. The rasping of metal against metal accompanied Perrin’s thunk of axe against wood.

It felt good. Why was it that his mind worked so much better when he was doing something? Loial spoke much of sitting and thinking. Perrin didn’t think he himself could figure anything out that way.

He split another log, the axe cutting clear. Was it really true? Could his own nature be to blame for the way he acted, not the wolves? He’d never acted like that back in the Two Rivers.

He split another log. I always was good at concentrating my attention. That was part of what had impressed Master Luhhan. Give Perrin a project and he’d keep working on it until he was done.

He split the halves of that log.

Maybe the changes in him were a result of encountering the outside world. He’d blamed the wolves for many things, and he had placed unnatural demands on Hopper. Wolves weren’t stupid or simple, but they did not care about things that humans did. It must have been very hard for Hopper to teach in a way that Perrin would understand.

What did the wolf owe him? Hopper had died during that fateful night, so long ago. The night when Perrin had first killed a man, the night Perrin had first lost control of himself in a battle. Hopper didn’t owe Perrin anything, but he had saved Perrin on several occasions—in fact, Perrin realized that Hopper’s intervention had helped to keep him from losing himself as a wolf.

He swung at a log, a glancing blow that knocked it to the side. He repositioned and continued, Gaul’s quiet sharpening soothing him. He split it.

Perrin grew caught up in what he was doing, maybe too much. That was true.

But at the same time, if a man wanted to get anything done, he had to work on one project until it was complete. Perrin had known men who never seemed to finish anything, and their farms were a mess. He couldn’t live like that.

There had to be a balance. Perrin had claimed he had been pulled into a world filled with problems much larger than he was. He had claimed he was a simple man.

What if he was wrong? What if he was a complex man who had once happened to live a simple life? After all, if he was so simple, why had he fallen in love with such a complicated woman?

The split logs were piling up. Perrin bent down, gathering up quarters, their grain rough against his fingers. Callused fingers; he would never be a lord like those milk-fed creatures from Cairhien. But there were other kinds of lords, men like Faile’s own father. Or men like Lan, who seemed more weapon than man.

Perrin stacked the wood. He enjoyed leading the wolves in his dream, but wolves didn’t expect you to protect them, or to provide for them, or to make laws for them. They didn’t cry to you when their loved ones died beneath your command.

It wasn’t the leadership that worried him. It was all the things that came with it.

He could smell Elyas approaching. With his loamy, natural earthen scent he smelled like a wolf. Almost.

“You’re up late,” Elyas said, stepping up. Perrin heard Gaul rustling, slipping his spear back into its place on his bowcase, then withdrawing with the silence of a sparrow streaking off into the sky. He would stay close, but would not listen in.

Perrin looked up at the dark sky, resting the axe on his shoulder. “Sometimes I feel more awake at night than during the day.”

Elyas smiled. Perrin didn’t see it, but he could smell the amusement.

“Did you ever try to avoid it, Elyas?” Perrin asked. “Ignore their voices, pretend that nothing about you had changed?”

“I did,” Elyas said. He had a soft low voice, one that somehow suggested the earth in motion. Distant rumbles. “I wanted to, but then the Aes Sedai wanted to gentle me. I had to flee.”

“Do you miss your old life?”

Elyas shrugged— Perrin could hear the motion, the clothing scraping against itself. “No Warder wants to abandon his duty. Sometimes, other things are more important. Or… well, maybe they are just more demanding. I don’t regret my choices.”

“I can’t leave, Elyas. I won’t.”

“I left my life for the wolves. That doesn’t mean you have to.”

“Noam had to,” Perrin said.

“Did he have to?” Elyas said.

“It consumed him. He stopped being human.”

He caught a scent of worry. Elyas had no answers.

“Do you ever visit wolves in your dreams, Elyas?” Perrin asked. “A place where dead wolves run and live again?”

Elyas turned, eyeing him. “That place is dangerous, Perrin. It’s another world, although tied to this one somehow. Legends say the Aes Sedai of old could go there.”

“And other people, too,” Perrin said, thinking of Slayer.

“Be careful in the dream. I stay away from it.” His scent was wary.

“Do you ever have trouble?” Perrin asked. “Separating yourself from the wolf?”

“I used to.”

“But not any longer?”

“I found a balance,” Elyas said.

“How?”

The older man fell still for a moment. “I wish I knew. It was just something I learned, Perrin. Something you’ll have to learn.”

Or end up like Noam. Perrin met Elyas’ golden eyes, then nodded, “Thank you.”

“For the advice?”

“No,” Perrin said. “For coming back. For showing me that one of us at least, can live with the wolves and not lose himself.”

“It’s nothing,” Elyas said. “I had forgotten that it could be nice to be around people for a change. I don’t know how long I can stay, though. The Last Hunt is almost here.”

Perrin looked up at the sky again. “That it is. Pass the word on to Tam and the others for me. I’ve made my decision. The Whitecloaks have picked a place to fight. I’ve decided to go ahead and meet them tomorrow.”

“All right,” Elyas said. “You don’t smell like you want to do it, though.”

“It needs to be done,” Perrin said. “And that’s that.” Everyone wanted him to be a lord. Well, this was the sort of thing lords did. Made decisions that nobody wanted to make.

It would still sicken him to give the order. He’d seen a vision of those wolves running sheep toward a beast. It seemed to him that maybe that was what he was doing, running the Whitecloaks toward destruction. They certainly wore the color of sheep’s wool.

But what to make of the vision of Faile and the others, approaching a cliff? Elyas moved off, leaving Perrin with the axe still on his shoulder. He felt as if he hadn’t been chopping logs, but bodies.