A Crown of Swords (53 page)

“What he needs,” Joline said firmly, “is to be taken into custody. For his own protection, and more. Three
ta’veren
coming out of a single village? And one of them the Dragon Reborn? Master Cauthon should be sent to the White Tower immediately.” And he had thought her pretty.

Merilille only shook her head. “You overestimate your situation here, Joline, if you think I will simply allow you to take the boy.”

“You overestimate yours, Merilille.” Joline stepped closer, until she was looking down at the other woman. Her lips curved, superior and condescending. “Or do you understand that it’s only a wish not to offend Tylin that keeps us from confining all of you on bread and water until you can be returned to the Tower?”

Mat expected Merilille to laugh in her face, but she shifted her head slightly as if she really wanted to break away from Joline’s gaze.

“You would not dare.” Sareitha wore Aes Sedai tranquility like a mask, face smooth and hands calmly adjusting her shawl, but her breathy voice shouted that it was a mask.

“These are children’s games, Joline,” Vandene murmured dryly. Surely that was who she was. She was the only one of the three who really did appear unruffled.

Faint splashes of color blossomed on Merilille’s cheeks as if the white-haired woman had spoken to her, but her own gaze steadied. “You can hardly expect us to go meekly,” she told Joline firmly, “and there are five of us. Seven, counting Nynaeve and Elayne.” The last was a clear afterthought, and reluctant at that.

Joline arched an eyebrow. Teslyn’s bony fingers did not loosen their grip any more than Vandene’s, but she studied Joline and Merilille with an unreadable expression. Aes Sedai were a country of strangers, where you never knew what to expect until it was too late. There were deep currents here. Deep currents around Aes Sedai could snatch a man to his death without them so much as noticing. Maybe it was time to start prying at fingers.

Laren’s sudden reappearance saved him the effort. Struggling to control her breath as if she had been running, the plump woman spread her skirts in a curtsy markedly deeper than she had given him. “Forgiveness for disturbing you, Aes Sedai, but the Queen summons Lord Cauthon. Forgiveness, please. It’s more than my ears are worth if I don’t bring him straight away.”

The Aes Sedai looked at her, all of them, till she began to fidget; then the two groups stared at one another as if trying to see who could out–Aes Sedai who. And then they looked at him. He wondered whether anybody was going to move.

“I can’t keep the Queen waiting, now can I?” he said cheerily. From the sniffs, you would have thought he had pinched somebody’s bottom. Even Laren’s brows drew down in disapproval.

“Release him, Adeleas,” Merilille said finally.

He frowned as the white-haired woman complied. Those two ought to wear little signs with their names, or different-color hair ribbons or something. She gave him another of those amused, knowing smiles. He hated that. It was a woman’s trick, not just Aes Sedai, and they usually did not know anything at all like what they wanted you to believe. “Teslyn?” he said. The grim Red still had hold of his coat with both hands. She peered up at him, ignoring everyone else. “The Queen?”

Merilille opened her mouth and hesitated, obviously changing what she had been going to say. “How long do you intend to stand here holding him, Teslyn? Perhaps you will explain to Tylin why her summons is disregarded.”

“Consider well who you do tie yourself to, Master Cauthon,” Teslyn said, still looking only at him. “Wrong choices can lead to an unpleasant future, even for a
ta’veren.
Consider well.” Then she let go.

As he followed Laren, he did not allow himself to show his eagerness to be away, but he did wish the woman would walk a little faster. She glided along ahead of him, regal as any queen. Regal as any Aes Sedai. When they reached the first turning, he looked over his shoulder. The five Aes Sedai were still standing there, staring after him. As if his look had been a signal, they exchanged silent glances and went, each in a different direction. Adeleas came toward him, but a dozen steps before reaching him she smiled at him again and disappeared through a doorway. Deep currents. He preferred swimming where his feet could touch the bottom of the pond.

Laren was waiting around the corner, hands on broad hips and her face much too smooth. Beneath her skirts, he suspected, her foot was tapping impatiently. He gave her his most winning smile. Giggling girls or gray-haired grandmothers, women softened for that one; it had won him kisses and eased him out of predicaments more often than he could count. It was almost as good as flowers. “That was neatly done, and I thank you. I’m sure the Queen doesn’t really want to see me.” If she did, he did not want to see her. Everything he thought about nobles was tripled for royalty. Nothing he had found in those old memories changed that, and some of those fellows had spent considerable time around kings and queens and the like. “Now, if you will just show me where Nynaeve and Elayne stay. . . .”

Strangely, the smile did not seem to have any effect. “I would not lie, Lord Cauthon. It would be more than my ears are worth. The Queen is waiting, my Lord. You are a very brave man,” she added, turning, then said something more under her breath. “Or a very great fool.” He doubted he had been supposed to hear that.

A choice between going to see the Queen and wandering miles of corridor until he stumbled on somebody who would tell him what he wanted to know? He went to see the Queen.

Tylin Quintara, by the Grace of the Light, Queen of Altara, Mistress of the Four Winds, Guardian of the Sea of Storms, High Seat of House Mitsobar, awaited him in a room with yellow walls and a pale blue ceiling, standing before a huge white fireplace with a stone lintel carved into a stormy sea.
She was well worth seeing, he decided. Tylin was not young—the shiny black hair cascading over her shoulders had gray at the temples, and faint lines webbed the corners of her eyes—nor was she exactly pretty, though the two thin scars on her cheeks had nearly vanished with age. Handsome came closer. But she was . . . imposing. Large dark eyes regarded him majestically, an eagle’s eyes. She had little real power—a man could ride beyond her writ in two or three days and still have a lot of Altara ahead—but he thought she might make even an Aes Sedai step back. Like Isebele of Dal Calain, who had made the Amyrlin Anghara come to her. That was one of the old memories; Dal Calain had vanished in the Trolloc Wars.

“Majesty,” he said, sweeping his hat wide in a bow and flourishing an imaginary cloak, “by your summons do I come.” Imposing or not, it was hard to keep his eyes away from the not small lace-trimmed oval where her white-sheathed marriage-knife hung. A very nicely rounded sight indeed, yet the more bosom a woman displayed, the less she wanted you to look. Openly, at least. White-sheathed; but he already knew she was a widow. Not that it mattered. He would as soon tangle himself with that fox-faced Darkfriend as with a queen. Not looking at all was difficult, but he managed. Most likely she would call guards rather than draw the gem-encrusted dagger thrust behind a woven-gold belt to match the collar her marriage knife hung from. Maybe that was why the dice were still rolling in his head. The possibility of an encounter with the headsman would set them spinning if anything did.

Layered silk petticoats rippled white and yellow as she crossed the room and walked slowly all the way around him. “You speak the Old Tongue,” she said once she stood in front of him again. Her voice was low-pitched and musical. Without waiting for a reply, she glided to a chair and sat, adjusting her green skirts. An unconscious gesture; her gaze remained fixed on him. He thought she could probably tell when his smallclothes had been washed last. “You wish to leave a message. I have what is necessary.” A lace fall at her wrist swayed as she gestured to a small writing table standing beneath a gilt-framed mirror. All the furnishings were gilded and carved like bamboo.

Tall triple-arched windows opening onto a wrought-iron balcony admitted a sea breeze that was surprisingly pleasant, if not exactly cool, yet Mat felt hotter than in the street, and it had nothing to do with her stare.
Deyeniye, dyu ninte concion ca’lyet ye.
That was what he had said. The bloody Old Tongue popping out of his mouth again without him knowing it. He had thought he had that little bother under control. No telling when those
bloody dice would stop or for what. Best to keep his eyes to himself and his mouth shut as much as possible. “I thank you, Majesty.” He made very sure of those words.

Thick sheets of pale paper already waited on the slanted table, at a comfortable height for writing. He propped his hat against the table leg. He could see her in the mirror. Watching. Why had he let his tongue run loose? Dipping a golden pen—what else would a queen have?—he composed what he wanted to write in his head before bending over the paper with an arm curled around it. His hand was awkward and square. He had no love of writing.

I followed a Darkfriend to the palace Jaichim Carridin is renting. She tried to kill me once, and maybe Rand as well. She was greeted like an old friend of the house.

For a moment he studied that, biting the end of the pen before realizing he was scoring the soft gold. Maybe Tylin would not notice. They needed to know about Carridin. What else? He added a few more reasonably worded lines. The last thing he wanted was to put their backs up.

Be sensible. If you have to go traipsing around, let me send a few men along to keep you from having your heads split open. Anyway, isn’t it about time I took you back to Egwene? There’s nothing here but heat and flies, and we can find plenty of those in Caemlyn.

There. They could not ask for pleasanter than that.

Blotting the page carefully, he folded it four times. Sand in a small golden bowl covered a coal. He puffed on it till it glowed, then used it to light a candle and picked up the stick of red wax. As the sealing wax dripped onto the edges of the paper, it suddenly struck him that he had a signet ring in his pocket. Just something the ringmaker had carved to show his skill, but better than a plain lump. The ring was slightly longer than the pool of solidifying wax, yet most of the sigil took.

For the first time he got a good look at what he had bought. Inside a border of large crescents, a running fox seemed to have startled two birds into flight. That made him grin. Too bad it was not a hand, for the Band, but appropriate enough. He certainly needed to be crafty as a fox to keep up with Nynaeve and Elayne, and if they were not exactly flighty, well. . . . Besides, the medallion had made him fond of foxes. He scrawled Nynaeve’s
name on the outside, and then Elayne’s, as an afterthought. One or the other, they should see it soon.

Turning with the sealed letter held in front of him, he gave a start as his knuckles brushed against Tylin’s bosom. He stumbled back against the writing table, staring and trying not to turn red. Staring at her face; just her face. He had not heard her approach. Best to simply ignore the brushing, not embarrass her any further. She probably thought he was a clumsy lout as it was. “There is something in this you should know, Majesty.” Insufficient room remained between them to lift the letter. “Jaichim Carridin is entertaining Darkfriends, and I don’t mean arresting them.”

“You are certain? Of course you are. No one would make that charge without being certain.” A furrow creased her forehead, but she gave her head a shake and the frown disappeared. “Let us speak of more pleasant things.”

He could have yelped. He told her the Whitecloak ambassador to her court was a Darkfriend, and all she did was grimace?

“You are Lord Mat Cauthon?” There was just a hint of question in the title. Her eyes minded him more than ever of an eagle’s. A queen could not like someone coming to her pretending to be a lord.

“Just Mat Cauthon.” Something told him she would hear a lie. Besides, letting people think he was a lord was just a ruse, one he would rather have managed without. In Ebou Dar you could find a duel any time you turned around, but few challenged lords except other lords. As it was, in the last month he had cracked a number of heads, bloodied four men and run half a mile to escape a woman. Tylin’s stare made him nervous. And those dice still rattled about in his skull. He wanted out of there. “If you’ll tell me where to leave the letter, Majesty . . . ?”

“The Daughter-Heir and Nynaeve Sedai seldom mention you,” she said, “but one learns to hear what is not said.” Casually she reached up and touched his cheek; he half-raised his own hand uncertainly. Had he smeared ink there, chewing the pen? Women did like to tidy things, including men. Maybe queens did, too. “What they do not say, but I hear, is that you are an untamed rogue, a gambler and chaser after women.” Her eyes held his, expression never altering a hair, and her voice stayed firm and cool, but as she spoke, her fingers stroked his other cheek. “Untamed men are often the most interesting. To talk to.” A finger outlined his lips. “An untamed rogue who travels with Aes Sedai, a
ta’veren
who, I think, makes them a little afraid. Uneasy, at the least. It takes a man with a strong liver to make Aes Sedai uneasy. How will you bend the Pattern in Ebou Dar, just Mat
Cauthon?” Her hand settled against his neck; he could feel his pulse throbbing against her fingers.

His mouth fell open. The writing table behind his back rattled against the wall as he tried to back away. The only way out was to push her aside or climb over her skirts. Women did not behave this way! Oh, some of those old memories suggested they did, but it was mainly memories of memories that that woman had done this or this woman had done that; the things he recalled clearly were battles for the most part, and no help here at all. She smiled, a faint curl of her lips that did not lessen the predatory gleam in her eyes. The hair on his head tried to stand up.

Her eyes flickered over his shoulder to the mirror, and she turned abruptly, leaving him gaping at her back as she moved away. “I must arrange to speak with you again, Master Cauthon. I—” She cut off as the door swung all the way open, apparently surprised, but then he realized she had seen it begin moving in the mirror.