Winter's Heart

'I was just thinking,' Elayne said, and heeled Fireheart through the gateway. Bed would be wonderful.

From the old practice field to the tall arched gates set in the pale, fifty-foot-high city walls was a short ride. The long market buildings lining the approach to the gates were empty at this hour, but sharp-eyed Guardsmen still kept a watch. They watched her and the others ride in apparently without recognizing her. Mercenaries, very likely. They would not know her unless they saw her on the Lion Throne. With the help of the Light, and luck, they would see her there.

Twilight was fast approaching, the sky turning a deep gray and the shadows slanting long across the streets. Very few people were still out and about, a scattering of folk hurrying to finish their day's work before going home to dinner and a warm fire. A pair of bearers carrying a merchant's dark lacquered sedan-chair went trotting past along a street ahead, and a few moments later one of the big pump-wagons rumbled in the other direction behind eight running horses, its iron-shod wheels loud on the paving stones. Another fire, somewhere. They happened most often at night. A patrol of four Guardsman walked their horses toward her and on, without looking at her twice. They did not recognize her anymore than the men at the gates.

Swaying in her saddle, she rode wishing for her bed. It was a shock to realize that she was being lifted down from her saddle. She opened eyes she did not remember closing and found herself being carried into the Palace in Birgitte's arms. 'Put me down,' she said tiredly. 'I can still walk.'

'You can hardly stand up,' Birgitte growled. 'Be still.'

'You cannot talk with her!' Aviendha said loudly.

'She really does need sleep, Master Norry,' Merilille said in firm tones. 'Tomorrow will have to do.'

'Forgive me, but tomorrow will not do,' Norry replied, for a wonder sounding very firm himself. 'It is urgent I speak with her now!'

Elayne's head wanted to wobble as she lifted it. Halwin Norry was clutching that leather folder to his skinny chest, as always, but the dry man who talked of crowned heads with the same dusty tone he used for speaking of the roof repairs was almost dancing on his toes in an effort to get by Aviendha and Merilille, who each had him by an arm, holding him back.

'Put me down, Birgitte,' she said again, and for the second wonder in as many moments, Birgitte obeyed. She kept a supporting arm around Elayne, though, for which Elayne was grateful. She was not sure her legs would have supported her for very long. 'What is it, Master Norry? Let the man go, Aviendha. Merilille?'

The First Clerk darted forward as soon they let go of him. 'Word began arriving soon after you left, my Lady,' he said, not sounding dusty at all. Worry pinched his brows. 'There are four armies… Small, I should say now, I suppose. Light, I recall when five thousand men was an army.' He rubbed a hand over his bald head, leaving the white tufts rising behind his ears in ruffled disarray. 'There are four small armies approaching Caemlyn, from the east,' he went on in a more usual tone for him. Almost. 'They will be here inside the week, I fear. Twenty thousand men. Perhaps thirty. I cannot be sure.' He half extended the folder to her as if offering to show her the papers inside. He was agitated.

'Who?' she said. Elenia had estates, and forces, in the east, but so did Naean. But neither could raise twenty thousand men. And the snow and mud should have held them until spring. 'Should' and 'would' build no bridges, she seemed to hear Lini's thin voice say.

'I do not know, my Lady,' Norry replied, 'not yet.'

It did not matter, Elayne supposed. Whoever it was, they were coming, and now. 'At first light, Master Norry, I want you to begin buying all the foodstuffs you can find outside the walls and get it brought in. Birgitte, have the bannerman announcing the signing bounty add that mercenaries have four days to sign with the Guards or they must leave the city. And have announcements made to the people, too, Master Norry. Whoever wants to leave before the siege begins should go now. It will cut down the number of mouths we have to feed, and it might lead a few more men to enlist in the Guards.' Pushing away from Birgitte's support, she strode along the hallway, heading for her apartments. The others were forced to follow. 'Merilille, let the Kinswomen know, and the Atha'an Miere. They may want to leave before it begins, too, Maps, Birgitte. Have the good maps brought to my apartments. And another thing, Master Norry…'

There was no time for sleep, no time for weariness. She had a city to defend.

Chapter 28: News in a Cloth Sack

The morning after Mat promised to help Teslyn, if he could—and Joline, and this Edesina he had yet to lay eyes on!—Tylin announced that she was departing the city.

'Suroth is going to show me how much of Altara I control now, pigeon,' she said. Her belt knife was stuck in the carved bedpost, and they were still lying on the rumpled linen sheets amid a tangle of bedding, him in only the silk scarf that hid the hanging scar around his neck, and her in her skin. A very fine skin it was, too, as smooth as he had ever touched. Idly she traced his other scars with a long, green-lacquered fingernail. One way and another, he had acquired quite a few, though not for want of trying to avoid them. His hide would not bring much at auction, that was for sure, but the scars fascinated her. 'It wasn't her idea, actually. Tuon thinks it will… help me… if I see with my own eyes instead of just on a map, and what that girl suggests, Suroth does. She would like to see it done yesterday, though. We'll be going by to'raken, so to cover the ground quickly. As much as two hundred miles in a day, it seems. Oh, don't look sick, piglet. I won't make you climb on one of those things.'

Mat heaved a sigh of relief. It had not been the prospect of flying that upset him. He thought he might actually like that. But if he was out of Ebou Dar for any length of time, the Light alone knew whether Teslyn or Joline or even this Edesina might grow impatient enough to do something stupid, or what idiocy Beslan might get up to. Beslan worried him almost as much as the women. Tylin, excited by her coming flight on one of the Seanchan beasts, looked more an eagle than ever.

'I'll be gone little more than a week, sweetling. Hmmm.' That green fingernail traced the foot-long puckering that slanted across his ribs. 'Shall I tie you to the bed so I'll know you will be safe till I return?'

Returning her wicked smile with his most winning grin took a bit of effort. He was fairly sure she was joking, but only fairly. The clothes she chose today put him all in red brilliant enough to hurt the eye; all red except for the flowers worked on the coat and the cloak, anyway, and his black hat and scarf. The white lace at his neck and wrists only made the rest look redder. Still, he scrambled into them, eager to get out other apartments. With Tylin, a man was wise not to be too sure of anything. She might not be joking, too.

Tylin had not exaggerated Suroth's impatience, it appeared. In little more than two hours by the jeweled cylinder-clock in Tylin's sitting room, a gift from Suroth, he was accompanying the Queen to the docks. Well, Suroth and Tylin rode at the head of the twenty or so other Blood that were to accompany them, and their assorted so'jhin, men and women who bowed their half-shaved heads to the Blood and stared down their noses at everyone else, while he rode behind on Pips. An Altaran Queen's 'pretty' could not ride with the Blood, which included Tylin herself now, of course. It was not as if he was a hereditary servant or anything of that level.

The Blood and most of the so'jhin were mounted on fine animals, sleek mares with arched necks and a delicate step, deep-chested geldings with fierce eyes and strong withers. His luck seemed to have no effect on horse racing, but he would have wagered on Pips against any of them. The blunt-nosed bay gelding was not showy, but Mat was sure he could outrun nearly all of those pretty animals in a sprint and all of them over a long haul. After so long in the stables, Pips wanted to frisk if he could not run, and it took all Mat's skill—well, all the skill that had somehow come with those other men's memories—to keep the animal in hand. Before they were halfway to the docks, though, his leg was aching to the hip. If he was to leave Ebou Dar any time soon, it would have to be by sea, or with Luca's show. He had a good notion how to make the man leave before spring, if it came to that. A dangerous notion, maybe, but he did not see much choice. The alternative was riskier still.

He was not alone at the rear. More than fifty men and women, blessedly wearing thick white woolen robes over the sheer garments they usually went around in, marched behind him in two rows, some leading packhorses with large wicker hampers full of delicacies. The Blood could not do without their servants; in fact, they seemed to think they would be sleeping rough, with so few. The da'covale seldom raised their eyes