A Crown of Swords (94 page)

“Yes, he is very modest,” she said, agreeing with Malindare, a woman more rounded than most Maidens, with the darkest hair Rand had seen on any Aiel. “Modesty is a man’s crowning glory.” Malindare nodded soberly, but Min wore a grin that nearly split her cheeks.

And, “Oh, no, Domeille; it would be a shame to spoil such a pretty face with a scar.” Domeille, grayer than Nandera, leaner, and with a thrusting chin, insisted that he was not pretty enough to do without a scar to set off what beauty he had. Her words. The rest was worse. The Maidens had always seemed to enjoy making his face red. Min certainly did.

“You have to dry off sooner or later, Rand,” she said, holding up a long
piece of white toweling with both hands. She stood a good three paces from the tub, and the Maidens had all backed into a watching ring. Min’s smile was so innocent any magistrate would have found her guilty on that alone. “Come and get dry, Rand.”

He had never been so relieved to pull on clothes in his life.

By that time, all his orders had been carried out, and everything was in readiness. Rand al’Thor might have been routed in a bathtub, but the Dragon Reborn was going to the Sea Folk in a style that would send them plummeting to their knees with awe.

All was ready as Rand had ordered in the courtyard at the front of the Sun Palace. Or almost all. The morning sun slanted shadows from the stepped towers, so only ten paces in front of the tall bronze gates lay in full light. Dashiva and Flinn and Narishma, the three Asha’man he had retained, waited beside their horses, even Dashiva resplendent with the silver sword and red-and-gold Dragon on his black collar, though he still touched the sword at his hip as if constantly surprised to find it there. A hundred of Dobraine’s armsmen sat their mounts behind Dobraine himself with two long banners that hung down in the still air, their dark armor newly lacquered so it glistened in the sun, and silk streamers of red and white and black tied below the heads of their lances. They raised a cheer when Rand appeared, his sword belt with its gilded Dragon buckle strapped over a red coat heavy with gold.

“Al’Thor! Al’Thor! Al’Thor!” filled the courtyard. People crowding the archers’ balconies joined in, Tairen and Cairhienin in their silks and laces who just a week before had no doubt cheered Colavaere as loudly. Men and women who would as soon he had never returned to Cairhien, some of them, waving their arms and giving voice. He raised the Dragon Scepter to acknowledge them, and they roared louder.

A thunderous roll of drums and a blare of trumpets rose through the cheers, produced by a dozen more of Dobraine’s men who wore crimson
tabards with the black-and-white disc on the chest, half carrying long trumpets draped in identical cloths, the other half with kettle drums also decorated slung on either side of the horses. Five Aes Sedai in their shawls came to meet him as he descended the broad stairs. At least, they glided toward him. Alanna gave him one searching look with those big dark penetrating eyes; the tiny knot of emotions in his skull said she was calmer, more relaxed, than he ever remembered. Then she made a small motion, and Min touched his arm and went aside with her. Bera and the others made small curtsies, inclining their heads slightly, as Aiel streamed out of the palace behind him. Nandera led two hundred Maidens—they were not about to be outshone by the “oathbreakers”—and Camar, a rangy Bent Peak Daryne grayer than Nandera and half a head taller than Rand, led two hundred
Seia Doon
who would not be outshone by
Far Dareis Mai
, let alone Cairhienin. They swung past on either side of him and the Aes Sedai to ring the courtyard. Bera like a proud farmwife and Alanna like some darkly beautiful queen, in their green-fringed shawls, and plump Rafela, even darker wrapped in her blue, watching him anxiously, and cool-eyed Faeldrin, yet another Green, her thin braids worked with colored beads, and slim Merana in her gray, whose frown made Rafela seem a picture of Aes Sedai serenity. Five.

“Where are Kiruna and Verin?” he demanded. “I called for all of you.”

“So you did, my Lord Dragon,” Bera answered smoothly. She made another curtsy, too; only the slightest dip, but it took him aback. “We could not find Verin; she is somewhere in the Aiel tents. Questioning the . . .” Her smooth tone faltered for one instant. “. . . the prisoners, I believe, in an attempt to learn what was planned once they reached Tar Valon.” Once he reached Tar Valon; she knew enough not to blurt that where anyone could hear. “And Kiruna is . . . consulting with Sorilea on a matter of protocol. But I’m quite certain she will be more than happy to join us if you send a personal summons to Sorilea. I could go myself, if you—”

He waved that away. Five should be enough. Perhaps Verin could learn something. Did he want to know? And Kiruna. A matter of
protocol
? “I’m glad you are getting on with the Wise Ones.” Bera started to speak, then closed her mouth firmly. Whatever Alanna was saying to Min, scarlet spots had flared in Min’s cheeks and she had raised her chin, though oddly, she seemed to be replying calmly enough. He wondered whether she would tell him. One thing he was sure of about women was that every last one had secret places in her heart, sometimes shared with another woman but never with a man. The only thing he was sure of about women.

“I didn’t come out here to stand all day,” he said irritably. The Aes Sedai had arranged themselves with Bera in the lead, the others half a step back. If it had not been her, it would have been Kiruna. Their own arrangements, not his. He did not really care so long as they held to their oaths, and he might have left it alone if not for Min and Alanna. “Merana will speak for you from now on; you will take your orders from her.”

By the suddenly widened eyes, you would have thought he had slapped every one of them. Including Merana. Even Alanna’s head whipped around. Why should they be startled? True, Bera or Kiruna had done almost all the talking since Dumai’s Wells, but Merana had been the ambassador sent to him at Caemlyn.

“If you are ready, Min?” he said, and without waiting for a reply strode out into the courtyard. The big, fiery-eyed black gelding he had ridden back from Dumai’s Wells had been brought out for him, with a high-cantled saddle all worked in gold and a crimson saddlecloth embroidered with the disc of black-and-white at each corner. The trappings suited the animal, and his name. Tai’daishar; in the Old Tongue, Lord of Glory. Horse and trappings both suited the Dragon Reborn.

As he mounted, Min led up the mouse-colored mare she had ridden back, snugging on her riding gloves before swinging into the saddle. “Seiera’s a fine animal,” she said, patting the mare’s arched neck. “I wish she was mine. I like her name, too. We call the flower a blue-eye around Baerlon, and they grow everywhere in the spring.”

“She’s yours,” Rand said. Whichever Aes Sedai the mare belonged to would not refuse to sell to him. He would give Kiruna a thousand crowns for Tai’daishar; she could not complain then; the finest stallion of Tairen blood stock never cost a tenth of that. “Did you have an interesting conversation with Alanna?”

“Nothing that would interest you,” she said offhandedly. But a faint touch of red stained her cheeks.

He snorted softly, then raised his voice. “Lord Dobraine, I’ve kept the Sea Folk waiting long enough, I think.”

The procession drew crowds along the broad avenues and filled the windows and rooftops as word raced ahead. Twenty of Dobraine’s lancers led, to clear the way, along with thirty Maidens and as many Black Eyes, then drummers, booming away—
droom, droom, droom, DROOM-DROOM
—and the trumpeters punctuating that with flourishes. Shouts from the onlookers nearly drowned drums and trumpets alike, a wordless roar that could have been rage as easily as approbation. The banners streamed out, just ahead of
Dobraine and behind Rand, the white Dragon Banner and the scarlet Banner of the Light, and veiled Aiel trotted alongside the lancers, whose streamers also floated in the air. Now and then a few flowers were hurled at him. Maybe they did not hate him. Maybe they only feared. It had to do.

“A train worthy of any king,” Merana said loudly, to be heard.

“Then it’s enough for the Dragon Reborn,” he replied sharply. “Will you stay back? And you, too, Min.” Other rooftops had held assassins. The arrow or crossbow bolt meant for him would not find its target in a woman today.

They did fall behind his big black, for all of three paces, and then they were right beside him again, Min telling him what Berelain had written about the Sea Folk on the ships, about the Jendai Prophecy and the Coramoor, and Merana adding what she knew of the prophecy, though she admitted that was not very much, little more than Min.

Watching the rooftops, he listened with half an ear. He did not hold
saidin
, but he could feel it in Dashiva and the other two, right behind him. He did not feel the tingle that would announce the Aes Sedai embracing the Source, but he had told them not to, without permission. Perhaps he should change that. They did seem to be keeping their oath. How could they not? They were Aes Sedai. A fine thing if he took an assassin’s blade while one of the sisters tried to decide whether serving meant saving him or obeying meant not channeling.

“Why are you laughing?” Min wanted to know. Seiera pranced closer, and she smiled up at him.

“This is no laughing matter, my Lord Dragon,” Merana said acidly on the other side. “The Atha’an Miere can be very particular. Any people grow fastidious when it comes to their prophecies.”

“The world is a laughing matter,” he told her. Min laughed along with him, but Merana sniffed and went right back to the Sea Folk as soon as he stopped.

At the river, the high city walls ran out into the water, flanking long gray stone docks that stretched out from the quay. Riverships and boats and barges of every kind and size were tied everywhere, the crews on deck to see the commotion, but the vessel Rand sought stood ready and waiting, lashed end-on to the end of a dock where all the laborers had already been cleared off. A longboat, it was called, a low narrow splinter without any masts, just one staff in the bow, four paces tall, topped by a lantern, and another at the stern. Nearly thirty paces in length and lined with as many long oars, it could not carry the cargo a sailing vessel the same size would,
but it had no need of the wind, either, and with a shallow draft, it could travel day and night, using rowers in shifts. Longboats ran the rivers with cargoes of importance and urgency. It had seemed appropriate.

The captain bowed repeatedly as Rand came down the boarding ramp with Min on his arm and the Aes Sedai and Asha’man at his heels. Elver Shaene was even skinnier than his craft in a yellow coat of Murandian cut that hung to his knees. “It’s an honor to be carrying you, my Lord Dragon,” he murmured, mopping his bald head with a large handkerchief. “An honor, it is. An honor, indeed. An honor.”

Plainly the man would rather have had his ship brim full of live vipers. He blinked at the Aes Sedai’s shawls and stared at their ageless faces and licked his lips, eyes flickering back to Rand uneasily. The Asha’man dropped his mouth open once he put their black coats together with rumor, and thereafter he avoided so much as a glance in their direction. Shaene watched Dobraine lead the men with the banners aboard, and the trumpeters, and the drummers lugging their drums, then eyed the horsemen lining the dock as if he suspected they might want to board, too. Nandera, with twenty Maidens, and Camar with twenty Black Eyes, all with
shoufa
wrapped around their heads though unveiled, made the captain step hastily to put the Aes Sedai between him and them. The Aiel wore scowls, for the heartbeat that needing to veil might slow them, but the Sea Folk might well know what a veil meant, and it would hardly do for them to think they were under attack. Rand thought Shaene’s handkerchief might yet rub away what thin gray fringe of hair he had left.